THE CROSSING
BOOK I.
the borderland
I WAS born under the Blue Ridge, and under that side which is
blue in the evening light, in a wild land of game and forest and
rushing waters. There, on the borders of a creek that runs into
the Yadkin River, in a cabin that was chinked with red mud, I came
into the world a subject of King George the Third, in that part of
his realm known as the province of North Carolina.
The cabin reeked of corn-pone and bacon, and the odor of pelts.
It had two shakedowns, on one of which I slept under a bearskin. A
rough stone chimney was reared outside, and the fireplace was as
long as my father was tall. There was a crane in it, and a bake
kettle; and over it great buckhorns held my father’s rifle when it
was not in use. On other horns hung jerked bear’s meat and venison
hams, and gourds for drinking cups, and bags of seed, and my
father’s best hunting shirt; also, in a neglected corner, several
articles of woman’s attire from pegs. These once belonged to my
mother. Among them was a gown of silk, of a fine, faded pattern,
over which I was wont to speculate. The women at the Cross-Roads,
twelve miles away, were dressed in coarse butternut wool and huge
sunbonnets. But when I questioned my father on these matters he
would give me no answers.
My father was — how shall I say what he was? To this day I can
only surmise many things of him. He was a Scotchman born, and I
know now that he had a slight Scotch accent. At the time of which
I write, my early childhood, he was a frontiersman and hunter. I
can see him now, with his hunting shirt and leggings and
moccasins; his powder horn, engraved with wondrous scenes; his
bullet pouch and tomahawk and hunting knife. He was a tall, lean
man with a strange, sad face. And he talked little save when he
drank too many “horns,” as they were called in that country. These
lapses of my father’s were a perpetual source of wonder to
me, — and, I must say, of delight. They occurred only when a passing
traveller who hit his fancy chanced that way, or, what was almost
as rare, a neighbor. Many a winter night I have lain awake under
the skins, listening to a flow of language that held me
spellbound, though I understood scarce a word of it.
“Virtuous and vicious every man must be,
Few in the extreme, but all in a degree.”
The chance neighbor or traveller was no less struck with wonder.
And many the time have I heard the query, at the Cross-Roads and
elsewhere, “Whar Alec Trimble got his larnin’?”
The truth is, my father was an object of suspicion to the
frontiersmen. Even as a child I knew this, and resented it. He had
brought me up in solitude, and I was old for my age, learned in
some things far beyond my years, and ignorant of others I should
have known. I loved the man passionately. In the long winter
evenings, when the howl of wolves and “painters” rose as the wind
lulled, he taught me to read from the Bible and the “Pilgrim’s
Progress.” I can see his long, slim fingers on the page. They
seemed but ill fitted for the life he led.
The love of rhythmic language was somehow born into me, and
many’s the time I have held watch in the cabin day and night while
my father was away on his hunts, spelling out the verses that have
since become part of my life.
As I grew older I went with him into the mountains, often on his
back; and spent the nights in open camp with my little moccasins
drying at the blaze. So I learned to skin a bear, and fleece off
the fat for oil with my hunting knife; and cure a deerskin and
follow a trail. At seven I even shot the long rifle, with a rest.
I learned to endure cold and hunger and fatigue and to walk in
silence over the mountains, my father never saying a word for days
at a spell. And often, when he opened his mouth, it would be to
recite a verse of Pope’s in a way that moved me strangely. For a
poem is not a poem unless it be well spoken.
In the hot days of summer, over against the dark forest the
bright green of our little patch of Indian corn rippled in the
wind. And towards night I would often sit watching the deep blue
of the mountain wall and dream of the mysteries of the land that
lay beyond. And by chance, one evening as I sat thus, my father
reading in the twilight, a man stood before us. So silently had he
come up the path leading from the brook that we had not heard him.
Presently my father looked up from his book, but did not rise. As
for me, I had been staring for some time in astonishment, for he
was a better-looking man than I had ever seen. He wore a deerskin
hunting shirt dyed black, but, in place of a coonskin cap with the
tail hanging down, a hat. His long rifle rested on the ground, and
he held a roan horse by the bridle.
“Howdy, neighbor?” said he.
I recall a fear that my father would not fancy him. In such
cases he would give a stranger food, and leave him to himself. My
father’s whims were past understanding. But he got up.
“Good evening,” said he.
The visitor looked a little surprised, as I had seen many do, at
my father’s accent.
“Neighbor,” said he, “kin you keep me over night?”
“Come in,” said my father.
We sat down to our supper of corn and beans and venison, of all
of which our guest ate sparingly. He, too, was a silent man, and
scarcely a word was spoken during the meal. Several times he
looked at me with such a kindly expression in his blue eyes, a
trace of a smile around his broad mouth, that I wished he might
stay with us always. But once, when my father said something about
Indians, the eyes grew hard as flint. It was then I remarked, with
a boy’s wonder, that despite his dark hair he had yellow eyebrows.
After supper the two men sat on the log step, while I set about
the task of skinning the deer my father had shot that day.
Presently I felt a heavy hand on my shoulder.
“What’s your name, lad?” he said.
I told him Davy.
“Davy, I’ll larn ye a trick worth a little time,” said he,
whipping out a knife. In a trice the red carcass hung between the
forked stakes, while I stood with my mouth open. He turned to me
and laughed gently.
“Some day you’ll cross the mountains and skin twenty of an
evening,” he said. “Ye’ll make a woodsman sure. You’ve got the
eye, and the hand.”
This little piece of praise from him made me hot all over.
“Game rare?” said he to my father.
“None sae good, now,” said my father.
“I reckon not. My cabin’s on Beaver Creek some forty mile above,
and game’s going there, too.”
“Settlements,” said my father. But presently, after a few whiffs
of his pipe, he added, “I hear fine things of this land across the
mountains, that the Indians call the Dark and Bluidy Ground.”
“And well named,” said the stranger.
“But a brave country,” said my father, “and all tramped down
with game. I hear that Daniel Boone and others have gone into it
and come back with marvellous tales. They tell me Boone was there
alone three months. He’s saething of a man. D’ye ken him?”
The ruddy face of the stranger grew ruddier still.
“My name’s Boone,” he said.
“What!” cried my father, “it wouldn’t be Daniel?”
“You’ve guessed it, I reckon.”
My father rose without a word, went into the cabin, and
immediately reappeared with a flask and a couple of gourds, one of
which he handed to our visitor.
“Tell me aboot it,” said he.
That was the fairy tale of my childhood. Far into the night I
lay on the dewy grass listening to Mr. Boone’s talk. It did not at
first flow in a steady stream, for he was not a garrulous man, but
my father’s questions presently fired his enthusiasm. I recall but
little of it, being so small a lad, but I crept closer and closer
until I could touch this superior being who had been beyond the
Wall. Marco Polo was no greater wonder to the Venetians than Boone
to me.
He spoke of leaving wife and children, and setting out for the
Unknown with other woodsmen. He told how, crossing over our blue
western wall into a valley beyond, they found a “Warrior’s Path”
through a gap across another range, and so down into the fairest
of promised lands. And as he talked he lost himself in the tale of
it, and the very quality of his voice changed. He told of a land
of wooded hill and pleasant vale, of clear water running over
limestone down to the great river beyond, the Ohio — a land of
glades, the fields of which were pied with flowers of wondrous
beauty, where roamed the buffalo in countless thousands, where elk
and deer abounded, and turkeys and feathered game, and bear in the
tall brakes of cane. And, simply, he told how, when the others had
left him, he stayed for three months roaming the hills alone with
Nature herself.
“But did you no’ meet the Indians?” asked my father.
“I seed one fishing on a log once,” said our visitor, laughing,
“but he fell into the water. I reckon he was drowned.”
My father nodded comprehendingly, — even admiringly.
“And again!” said he.
“Wal,” said Mr. Boone, “we fell in with a war party of Shawnees
going back to their lands north of the great river. The critters
took away all we had. It was hard,” he added reflectively; “I had
staked my fortune on the venter, and we’d got enough skins to make
us rich. But, neighbor, there is land enough for you and me, as
black and rich as Canaan.”
“‘The Lord is my shepherd,’” said my father, lapsing into verse.
“‘The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. He leadeth me into
green pastures, and beside still waters.’”
For a time they were silent, each wrapped in his own thought,
while the crickets chirped and the frogs sang. From the distant
forest came the mournful hoot of an owl.
“And you are going back?” asked my father, presently.
“Aye, that I am. There are many families on the Yadkin below
going, too. And you, neighbor, you might come with us. Davy is the
boy that would thrive in that country.”
My father did not answer. It was late indeed when we lay down to
rest, and the night I spent between waking and dreaming of the
wonderland beyond the mountains, hoping against hope that my
father would go. The sun was just flooding the slopes when our
guest arose to leave, and my father bade him God-speed with a
heartiness that was rare to him. But, to my bitter regret, neither
spoke of my father’s going. Being a man of understanding, Mr.
Boone knew it were little use to press. He patted me on the head.
“You’re a wise lad, Davy,” said he. “I hope we shall meet
again.”
He mounted his roan and rode away down the slope, waving his
hand to us. And it was with a heavy heart that I went to feed our
white mare, whinnying for food in the lean-to.
CHAPTER II.
wars and rumors of wars
AND SO our life went on the same, but yet not the same. For I
had the Land of Promise to dream of, and as I went about my tasks
I conjured up in my mind pictures of its beauty. You will forgive
a backwoods boy, — self-centred, for lack of wider interest, and
with a little imagination. Bear hunting with my father, and an
occasional trip on the white mare twelve miles to the Cross-Roads
for salt and other necessaries, were the only diversions to break
the routine of my days. But at the Cross-Roads, too, they were
talking of Kaintuckee. For so the Land was called, the Dark and
Bloody Ground.
The next year came a war on the Frontier, waged by Lord Dunmore,
Governor of Virginia. Of this likewise I heard at the Cross-Roads,
though few from our part seemed to have gone to it. And I heard
there, for rumors spread over mountains, that men blazing in the
new land were in danger, and that my hero, Boone, was gone out to
save them. But in the autumn came tidings of a great battle far to
the north, and of the Indians suing for peace.
The next year came more tidings of a sort I did not understand.
I remember once bringing back from the Cross-Roads a crumpled
newspaper, which my father read again and again, and then folded
up and put in his pocket. He said nothing to me of these things.
But the next time I went to the Cross-Roads, the woman asked me: —
“Is your Pa for the Congress?”
“What’s that?” said I.
“I reckon he ain’t,” said the woman, tartly. I recall her dimly,
a slattern creature in a loose gown and bare feet, wife of the
storekeeper and wagoner, with a swarm of urchins about her. They
were all very natural to me thus. And I remember a battle with one
of these urchins in the briers, an affair which did not add to the
love of their family for ours. There was no money in that country,
and the store took our pelts in exchange for what we needed from
civilization. Once a month would I load these pelts on the white
mare, and make the journey by the path down the creek. At times I
met other settlers there, some of them not long from Ireland, with
the brogue still in their mouths. And again, I saw the wagoner
with his great canvas-covered wagon standing at the door, ready to
start for the town sixty miles away. ’Twas he brought the news of
this latest war.
One day I was surprised to see the wagoner riding up the path to
our cabin, crying out for my father, for he was a violent man. And
a violent scene followed. They remained for a long time within the
house, and when they came out the wagoner’s face was red with
rage. My father, too, was angry, but no more talkative than usual.
“Ye say ye’ll not help the Congress?” shouted the wagoner.
“I’ll not,” said my father.
“Ye’ll live to rue this day, Alec Trimble,” cried the man. “Ye
may think ye’re too fine for the likes of us, but there’s them in
the settlement that knows about ye.”
With that he flung himself on his horse, and rode away. But the
next time I went to the Cross-Roads the woman drove me away with
curses, and called me an aristocrat. Wearily I tramped back the
dozen miles up the creek, beside the mare, carrying my pelts with
me; stumbling on the stones, and scratched by the dry briers. For
it was autumn, the woods all red and yellow against the green of
the pines. I sat down beside the old beaver dam to gather courage
to tell my father. But he only smiled bitterly when he heard it.
Nor would he tell me what the word aristocrat meant.
That winter we spent without bacon, and our salt gave out at
Christmas. It was at this season, if I remember rightly, that we
had another visitor. He arrived about nightfall one gray day, his
horse jaded and cut, and he was dressed all in wool, with a great
coat wrapped about him, and high boots. This made me stare at him.
When my father drew back the bolt of the door he, too, stared and
fell back a step.
“Come in,” said he.
“D’ye ken me, Alec?” said the man.
He was a tall, spare man like my father, a Scotchman, but his
hair was in a cue.
“Come in, Duncan,” said my father, quietly. “Davy, run out for
wood.”
Loath as I was to go, I obeyed. As I came back dragging a log
behind me I heard them in argument, and in their talk there was
much about the Congress, and a woman named Flora Macdonald, and a
British fleet sailing southward.
“We’ll have two thousand Highlanders and more to meet the fleet.
And ye’ll sit at hame, in this hovel ye’ve made yeresel” (and he
glanced about disdainfully) “and no help the King?” He brought his
fist down on the pine boards.
“Ye did no help the King greatly at Culloden, Duncan,” said my
father, dryly.
Our visitor did not answer at once.
“The Yankee Rebels ’ll no help the House of Stuart,” said he,
presently. “And Hanover’s coom to stay. Are ye, too, a Rebel, Alec
Ritchie?”
I remember wondering why he said Ritchie.
“I’ll no take a hand in this fight,” answered my father.
And that was the end of it. The man left with scant ceremony, I
guiding him down the creek to the main trail. He did not open his
mouth until I parted with him.
“Puir Davy,” said he, and rode away in the night, for the moon
shone through the clouds.
I remember these things, I suppose, because I had nothing else
to think about. And the names stuck in my memory, intensified by
later events, until I began to write a diary.
And now I come to my travels. As the spring drew on I had had a
feeling that we could not live thus forever, with no market for
our pelts. And one day my father said to me abruptly: —
“Davy, we’ll be travelling.”
“Where?” I asked.
“Ye’ll ken soon enough,” said he. “We’ll go at crack o’ day.”
We went away in the wild dawn, leaving the cabin desolate. We
loaded the white mare with the pelts, and my father wore a woollen
suit like that of our Scotch visitor, which I had never seen
before. He had clubbed his hair. But, strangest of all, he carried
in a small parcel the silk gown that had been my mother’s. We had
scant other baggage.
We crossed the Yadkin at a ford, and climbing the hills to the
south of it we went down over stony traces, down and down, through
rain and sun; stopping at rude cabins or taverns, until we came
into the valley of another river. This I know now was the Catawba.
My memories of that ride are as misty as the spring weather in the
mountains. But presently the country began to open up into broad
fields, some of these abandoned to pines. And at last, splashing
through the stiff red clay that was up to the mare’s fetlocks, we
came to a place called Charlotte Town. What a day that was for me!
And how I gaped at the houses there, finer than any I had ever
dreamed of! That was my first sight of a town. And how I listened
open-mouthed to the gentlemen at the tavern! One I recall had a
fighting head with a lock awry, and a negro servant to wait on
him, and was the principal spokesman. He, too, was talking of war.
The Cherokees had risen on the western border. He was telling of
the massacre of a settlement, in no mild language.
“Sirs,” he cried, “the British have stirred the redskins to
this. Will you sit here while women and children are scalped, and
those devils” (he called them worse names) “Stuart and Cameron go
unpunished?”
My father got up from the corner where he sat, and stood beside
the man.
“I ken Alec Cameron,” said he.
The man looked at him with amazement.
“Ay?” said he, “I shouldn’t think you’d own it. Damn him,” he
cried, “if we catch him we’ll skin him alive.”
“I ken Cameron,” my father repeated, “and I’ll gang with you to
skin him alive.”
The man seized his hand and wrung it.
“But first I must be in Charlestown,” said my father.
The next morning we sold our pelts. And though the mare was
tired, we pushed southward, I behind the saddle. I had much to
think about, wondering what was to become of me while my father
went to skin Cameron. I had not the least doubt that he would do
it. The world is a storybook to a lad of nine, and the thought of
Charlestown filled me with a delight unspeakable. Perchance he
would leave me in Charlestown.
At nightfall we came into a settlement called the Waxhaws. And
there being no tavern there, and the mare being very jaded and the
roads heavy, we cast about for a place to sleep. The sunlight
slanting over the pine forest glistened on the pools in the wet
fields. And it so chanced that splashing across these, swinging a
milk-pail over his head, shouting at the top of his voice, was a
red-headed lad of my own age. My father hailed him, and he came
running towards us, still shouting, and vaulted the rails. He
stood before us, eying me with a most mischievous look in his blue
eyes, and dabbling in the red mud with his toes. I remember I
thought him a queer-looking boy. He was lanky, and he had a very
long face under his tousled hair.
My father asked him where he could spend the night.
“Wal,” said the boy, “I reckon Uncle Crawford might take you in.
And again he mightn’t.”
He ran ahead, still swinging the pail. And we, following, came
at length to a comfortable-looking farmhouse. As we stopped at the
doorway a stout, motherly woman filled it. She held her knitting
in her hand.
“You Andy!” she cried, “have you fetched the milk?”
Andy tried to look repentant.
“I declare I’ll tan you,” said the lady. “Git out this instant.
What rascality have you been in?”
“I fetched home visitors, Ma,” said Andy.
“Visitors!” cried the lady. “What ’ll your Uncle Crawford say?”
And she looked at us smiling, but with no great hostility.
“Pardon me, Madam,” said my father, “if we seem to intrude. But
my mare is tired, and we have nowhere to stay.”
Uncle Crawford did take us in. He was a man of substance in that
country, — a north of Ireland man by birth, if I remember right.
I went to bed with the red-headed boy, whose name was Andy
Jackson. I remember that his mother came into our little room
under the eaves and made Andy say his prayers, and me after him.
But when she was gone out, Andy stumped his toe getting into bed
in the dark and swore with a brilliancy and vehemence that
astonished me.
It was some hours before we went to sleep, he plying me with
questions about my life, which seemed to interest him greatly, and
I returning in kind.
“My Pa’s dead,” said Andy. “He came from a part of Ireland where
they are all weavers. We’re kinder poor relations here. Aunt
Crawford’s sick, and Ma keeps house. But Uncle Crawford’s good,
an’ lets me go to Charlotte Town with him sometimes.”
I recall that he also boasted some about his big brothers, who
were away just then.
Andy was up betimes in the morning, to see us start. But we
didn’t start, because Mr. Crawford insisted that the white mare
should have a half day’s rest. Andy, being hustled off unwillingly
to the “Old Field” school, made me go with him. He was a very
headstrong boy.
I was very anxious to see a school. This one was only a log
house in a poor, piny place, with a rabble of boys and girls
romping at the door. But when they saw us they stopped. Andy
jumped into the air, let out a war-whoop, and flung himself into
the midst, scattering them right and left, and knocking one boy
over and over. “I’m Billy Buck!” he cried. “I’m a hull regiment o’
Rangers. Let th’ Cherokees mind me!”
“Way for Sandy Andy!” cried the boys. “Where’d you get the new
boy, Sandy?”
“His name’s Davy,” said Andy, “and his Pa’s goin’ to fight the
Cherokees. He kin lick tarnation out’n any o’ you.”
Meanwhile I held back, never having been thrown with so many of
my own kind.
“He’s shot painters and b’ars,” said Andy. “An’ skinned ’em. Kin
you lick him, Smally? I reckon not.”
Now I had not come to the school for fighting. So I held back.
Fortunately for me, Smally held back also. But he tried skilful
tactics.
“He kin throw you, Sandy.”
Andy faced me in an instant.
“Kin you?” said he.
There was nothing to do but try, and in a few seconds we were
rolling on the ground, to the huge delight of Smally and the
others, Andy shouting all the while and swearing. We rolled and
rolled and rolled in the mud, until we both lost our breath, and
even Andy stopped swearing, for want of it. After a while the boys
were silent, and the thing became grim earnest. At length, by some
accident rather than my own strength, both his shoulders touched
the ground. I released him. But he was on his feet in an instant
and at me again like a wildcat.
“Andy won’t stay throwed,” shouted a boy. And before I knew it
he had my shoulders down in a puddle. Then I went for him, and
affairs were growing more serious than a wrestle, when Smally,
fancying himself safe, and no doubt having a grudge, shouted out: —
“Tell him he slobbers, Davy.”
Andy did slobber. But that was the end of me, and the beginning
of Smally. Andy left me instantly, not without an intimation that
he would come back, and proceeded to cover Smally with red clay
and blood. However, in the midst of this turmoil the schoolmaster
arrived, haled both into the schoolhouse, held court, and flogged
Andrew with considerable gusto. He pronounced these words
afterwards, with great solemnity: —
“Andrew Jackson, if I catch ye fightin’ once more, I’ll be
afther givin’ ye lave to lave the school.”
I parted from Andy at noon with real regret. He was the first
boy with whom I had ever had any intimacy. And I admired him:
chiefly, I fear, for his fluent use of profanity and his fighting
qualities. He was a merry lad, with a wondrous quick temper but a
good heart. And he seemed sorry to say good-by. He filled my
pockets with June apples — unripe, by the way — and told me to
remember him when I got till Charlestown.
I remembered him much longer than that, and usually with a shock
of surprise.
DOWN and down we went, crossing great rivers by ford and ferry,
until the hills flattened themselves and the country became a long
stretch of level, broken by the forests only; and I saw many
things I had not thought were on the earth. Once in a while I
caught glimpses of great red houses, with stately pillars, among
the trees. They put me in mind of the palaces in Bunyan, their
windows all golden in the morning sun; and as we jogged ahead, I
pondered on the delights within them. I saw gangs of negroes
plodding to work along the road, an overseer riding behind them
with his gun on his back; and there were whole cotton fields in
these domains blazing in primrose flower, — a new plant here, so my
father said. He was willing to talk on such subjects. But on
others, and especially our errand to Charlestown, he would say
nothing. And I knew better than to press him.
One day, as we were crossing a dike between rice swamps spread
with delicate green, I saw the white tops of wagons flashing in
the sun at the far end of it. We caught up with them, the wagoners
cracking their whips and swearing at the straining horses. And lo!
in front of the wagons was an army, — at least my boyish mind
magnified it to such. Men clad in homespun, perspiring and
spattered with mud, were straggling along the road by fours,
laughing and joking together. The officers rode, and many of these
had blue coats and buff waistcoats, — some the worse for wear. My
father was pushing the white mare into the ditch to ride by, when
one hailed him.
“Hullo, my man,” said he, “are you a friend to Congress?”
“I’m off to Charlestown to leave the lad,” said my father, “and
then to fight the Cherokees.”
“Good,” said the other. And then, “Where are you from?”
“Upper Yadkin,” answered my father. "And you?”
The officer, who was a young man, looked surprised. But then he
laughed pleasantly.
“We’re North Carolina troops, going to join Lee in Charlestown,”
said he. "The British are sending a fleet and regiments against
it.”
“Oh, aye,” said my father, and would have passed on. But he was
made to go before the Colonel, who plied him with many questions.
Then he gave us a paper and dismissed us.
We pursued our journey through the heat that shimmered up from
the road, pausing now and again in the shade of a wayside tree. At
times I thought I could bear the sun no longer. But towards four
o’clock of that day a great bank of yellow cloud rolled up,
darkening the earth save for a queer saffron light that stained
everything, and made our very faces yellow. And then a wind burst
out of the east with a high mournful note, as from a great flute
afar, filling the air with leaves and branches of trees. But it
bore, too, a savor that was new to me, — a salt savor, deep and
fresh, that I drew down into my lungs. And I knew that we were
near the ocean. Then came the rain, in great billows, as though
the ocean itself were upon us.
The next day we crossed a ferry on the Ashley River, and rode
down the sand of Charlestown neck. And my most vivid remembrance
is of the great trunks towering half a hundred feet in the air,
with a tassel of leaves at the top, which my father said were
palmettos. Something lay heavy on his mind. For I had grown to
know his moods by a sort of silent understanding. And when the
roofs and spires of the town shone over the foliage in the
afternoon sun, I felt him give a great sigh that was like a sob.
And how shall I describe the splendor of that city? The sandy
streets, and the gardens of flower and shade, heavy with the plant
odors; and the great houses with their galleries and porticos set
in the midst of the gardens, that I remember staring at wistfully.
But before long we came to a barricade fixed across the street,
and then to another. And presently, in an open space near a large
building, was a company of soldiers at drill.
It did not strike me as strange then that my father asked his
way of no man, but went to a little ordinary in a humbler part of
the town. After a modest meal in a corner of the public room, we
went out for a stroll. Then, from the wharves, I saw the bay
dotted with islands, their white sand sparkling in the evening
light, and fringed with strange trees, and beyond, of a deepening
blue, the ocean. And nearer, — greatest of all delights to
me, — riding on the swell was a fleet of ships. My father gazed at
them long and silently, his palm over his eyes.
“Men-o’-war from the old country, lad,” he said after a while.
"They’re a brave sight.”
“And why are they here?” I asked.
“They’ve come to fight,” said he, “and take the town again for
the King.”
It was twilight when we turned to go, and then I saw that many
of the warehouses along the wharves were heaps of ruins. My father
said this was that the town might be the better defended.
We bent our way towards one of the sandy streets where the great
houses were. And to my surprise we turned in at a gate, and up a
path leading to the high steps of one of these. Under the high
portico the door was open, but the house within was dark. My
father paused, and the hand he held to mine trembled. Then he
stepped across the threshold, and raising the big polished knocker
that hung on the panel, let it drop. The sound reverberated
through the house, and then stillness. And then, from within, a
shuffling sound, and an old negro came to the door. For an instant
he stood staring through the dusk, and broke into a cry.
“Marse Alec!” he said.
“Is your master at home?” said my father.
Without another word he led us through a deep hall, and out into
a gallery above the trees of a back garden, where a gentleman sat
smoking a long pipe. The old negro stopped in front of him.
“Marse John,” said he, his voice shaking, “heah’s Marse Alec
done come back.”
The gentleman got to his feet with a start. His pipe fell to the
floor, and the ashes scattered on the boards and lay glowing
there.
“Alec!” he cried, peering into my father’s face, “Alec! You’re
not dead.”
“John,” said my father, “can we talk here?”
“Good God!” said the gentleman, “you’re just the same. To think
of it — to think of it! Breed, a light in the drawing-room.”
There was no word spoken while the negro was gone, and the time
seemed very long. But at length he returned, a silver candlestick
in each hand.
“Careful,” cried the gentleman, petulantly, “you’ll drop them.”
He led the way into the house, and through the hall to a massive
door of mahogany with a silver door-knob. The grandeur of the
place awed me, and well it might. Boy-like, I was absorbed in
this. Our little mountain cabin would almost have gone into this
one room. The candles threw their flickering rays upward until
they danced on the high ceiling. Marvel of marvels, in the oval
left clear by the heavy, rounded cornice was a picture.
The negro set down the candles on the marble top of a table. But
the air of the room was heavy and close, and the gentleman went to
a window and flung it open. It came down instantly with a crash,
so that the panes rattled again.
“Curse these Rebels,” he shouted, “they’ve taken our window
weights to make bullets.”
Calling to the negro to pry open the window with a
walking-stick, he threw himself into a big, upholstered chair.
’Twas then I remarked the splendor of his clothes, which were
silk. And he wore a waistcoat all sewed with flowers. With a boy’s
intuition, I began to dislike him intensely.
“Damn the Rebels!” he began. "They’ve driven his Lordship away.
I hope his Majesty will hang every mother’s son of ’em. All
pleasure of life is gone, and they’ve folly enough to think they
can resist the fleet. And the worst of it is,” cried he, “the
worst of it is, I’m forced to smirk to them, and give good gold to
their government.” Seeing that my father did not answer, he asked:
"Have you joined the Highlanders? You were always for fighting.”
“I’m to be at Cherokee Ford on the twentieth,” said my father.
"We’re to scalp the redskins and Cameron, though ’tis not known.”
“Cameron!” shrieked the gentleman. "But that’s the other side,
man! Against his Majesty?”
“One side or t’other,” said my father, “’tis all one against
Alec Cameron.”
The gentleman looked at my father with something like terror in
his eyes.
“You’ll never forgive Cameron,” he said.
“I’ll no forgive anybody who does me a wrong,” said my father.
“And where have you been all these years, Alec?” he asked
presently. "Since you went off with — ”
“I’ve been in the mountains, leading a pure life,” said my
father. "And we’ll speak of nothing, if you please, that’s gone
by.”
“And what will you have me do?” said the gentleman, helplessly.
“Little enough,” said my father. "Keep the lad till I come
again. He’s quiet. He’ll no trouble you greatly. Davy, this is Mr.
Temple. You’re to stay with him till I come again.”
“Come here, lad,” said the gentleman, and he peered into my
face. "You’ll not resemble your mother.”
“He’ll resemble no one,” said my father, shortly.
“Good-by, Davy. Keep this till I come again.” And he gave me the
parcel made of my mother’s gown. Then he lifted me in his strong
arms and kissed me, and strode out of the house. We listened in
silence as he went down the steps, and until his footsteps died
away on the path. Then the gentleman rose and pulled a cord
hastily. The negro came in.
“Put the lad to bed, Breed,” said he.
“Whah, suh?”
“Oh, anywhere,” said the master. He turned to me.
“I’ll be better able to talk to you in the morning, David,” said
he.
I followed the old servant up the great stairs, gulping down a
sob that would rise, and clutching my mother’s gown tight under my
arm. Had my father left me alone in our cabin for a fortnight, I
should not have minded. But here, in this strange house, amid such
strange surroundings, I was heartbroken. The old negro was very
kind. He led me into a little bedroom, and placing the candle on a
polished dresser, he regarded me with sympathy.
“So you’re Miss Lizbeth’s boy,” said he. "An’ she dade. An’
Marse Alec rough an’ hard es though he been bo’n in de woods.
Honey, ol’ Breed’ll tek care ob you. I’ll git you one o’ dem night
rails Marse Nick has, and some ob his’n close in de mawnin’.”
These things I remember, and likewise sobbing myself to sleep in
the four-poster. Often since I have wished that I had questioned
Breed of many things on which I had no curiosity then, for he was
my chief companion in the weeks that followed. He awoke me bright
and early the next day.
“Heah’s some close o’ Marse Nick’s you kin wear, honey,” he
said.
“Who is Master Nick?” I asked.
Breed slapped his thigh.
“Marse Nick Temple, Marsa’s son. He’s ’bout you size, but he
ain’ no mo’ laik you den a Jack rabbit’s laik an’ owl. Dey ain’
none laik Marse Nick fo’ gittin’ into trouble-and gittin’ out
agin.”
“Where is he now?” I asked.
“He at Temple Bow, on de Ashley Ribber. Dat’s de Marsa’s
barony.”
“His what?”
“De place whah he lib at, in de country.”
“And why isn’t the master there?”
I remember that Breed gave a wink, and led me out of the window
onto a gallery above the one where we had found the master the
night before. He pointed across the dense foliage of the garden to
a strip of water gleaming in the morning sun beyond.
“See dat boat?” said the negro. "Sometime de Marse he tek ar
ride in dat boat at night. Sometime gentlemen comes heah in a
pow’ful hurry to git away, out’n de harbor whah de English is at.”
By that time I was dressed, and marvellously uncomfortable in
Master Nick’s clothes. But as I was going out of the door, Breed
hailed me.
“Marse Dave,” — it was the first time I had been called
that, — "Marse Dave, you ain’t gwineter tell?”
“Tell what?” I asked.
“Bout’n de boat, and Marsa agwine away nights.”
“No,” said I, indignantly.
“I knowed you wahn’t,” said Breed. "You don’ look as if you’d
tell anything.”
We found the master pacing the lower gallery. At first he barely
glanced at me, and nodded. After a while he stopped, and began to
put to me many questions about my life: when and how I had lived.
And to some of my answers he exclaimed, “Good God!” That was all.
He was a handsome man, with hands like a woman’s, well set off by
the lace at his sleeves. He had fine-cut features, and the white
linen he wore was most becoming.
“David,” said he, at length, and I noted that he lowered his
voice, “David, you seem a discreet lad. Pay attention to what I
tell you. And mark! if you disobey me, you will be well whipped.
You have this house and garden to play in, but you are by no means
to go out at the front of the house. And whatever you may see or
hear, you are to tell no one. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir,” I said.
“For the rest,” said he, “Breed will give you food, and look out
for your welfare.”
And so he dismissed me. They were lonely days after that for a
boy used to activity, and only the damp garden paths and lawns to
run on. The creek at the back of the garden was stagnant and
marshy when the water fell, and overhung by leafy boughs. On each
side of the garden was a high brick wall. And though I was often
tempted to climb it, I felt that disobedience was disloyalty to my
father. Then there was the great house, dark and lonely in its
magnificence, over which I roamed until I knew every corner of it.
I was most interested of all in the pictures of men and women in
quaint, old-time costumes, and I used during the great heat of the
day to sit in the drawing-room and study these, and wonder who
they were and when they lived. Another amusement I had was to
climb into the deep windows and peer through the blinds across the
front garden into the street. Sometimes men stopped and talked
loudly there, and again a rattle of drums would send me running to
see the soldiers. I recall that I had a poor enough notion of what
the fighting was all about. And no wonder. But I remember chiefly
my insatiable longing to escape from this prison, as the great
house soon became for me. And I yearned with a yearning I cannot
express for our cabin in the hills and the old life there.
I caught glimpses of the master on occasions only, and then I
avoided him; for I knew he had no wish to see me. Sometimes he
would be seated in the gallery, tapping his foot on the floor, and
sometimes pacing the garden walks with his hands opening and
shutting. And one night I awoke with a start, and lay for a while
listening until I heard something like a splash, and the scraping
of the bottom-boards of a boat. Irresistibly I jumped out of bed,
and running to the gallery rail I saw two dark figures moving
among the leaves below. The next morning I came suddenly on a
strange gentleman in the gallery. He wore a flowered dressing-gown
like the one I had seen on the master, and he had a jolly, round
face. I stopped and stared.
“Who the devil are you?” said he, but not unkindly.
“My name is David Trimble,” said I, “and I come from the
mountains.”
He laughed.
“Mr. David Trimble-from-the-mountains, who the devil am I?”
“I don’t know, sir,” and I started to go away, not wishing to
disturb him.
“Avast!” he cried. "Stand fast. See that you remember that.”
“I’m not here of my free will, sir, but because my father wishes
it. And I’ll betray nothing.”
Then he stared at me.
“How old did you say you were?” he demanded.
“I didn’t say,” said I.
“And you are of Scotch descent?” said he.
“I didn’t say so, sir.”
“You’re a rum one,” said he, laughing again, and he disappeared
into the house.
That day, when Breed brought me my dinner on my gallery, he did
not speak of a visitor. You may be sure I did not mention the
circumstance. But Breed always told me the outside news.
“Dey’s gittin’ ready fo’ a big fight, Marse Dave,” said he.
"Mister Moultrie in the fo’t in de bay, an’ Marse Gen’l Lee tryin’
for to boss him. Dey’s Rebels. An’ Marse Admiral Parker an’ de
King’s reg’ments fixin’ fo’ to tek de fo’t, an’ den Charlesto’n.
Dey say Mister Moultrie ain’t got no mo’ chance dan a treed
’possum.”
“Why, Breed?” I asked. I had heard my father talk of England’s
power and might, and Mister Moultrie seemed to me a very brave man
in his little fort.
“Why!” exclaimed the old negro. "You ain’t neber read no hist’ry
books. I knows some of de gentlemen wid Mister Moultrie. Dey ain’t
no soldiers. Some is fine gentlemen, to be suah, but it’s jist
foolishness to fight dat fleet an’ army. Marse Gen’l Lee hisself,
he done sesso. I heerd him.”
“And he’s on Mister Moultrie’s side?” I asked.
“Sholy,” said Breed. "He’s de Rebel gen’l.”
“Then he’s a knave and a coward!” I cried with a boy’s
indignation. "Where did you hear him say that?” I demanded,
incredulous of some of Breed’s talk.
“Right heah in dis house,” he answered, and quickly clapped his
hand to his mouth, and showed the whites of his eyes. "You ain’t
agwineter tell dat, Marse Dave?”
“Of course not,” said I. And then: "I wish I could see Mister
Moultrie in his fort, and the fleet.”
“Why, honey, so you kin,” said Breed.
The good-natured negro dropped his work and led the way
upstairs, I following expectant, to the attic. A rickety ladder
rose to a kind of tower (cupola, I suppose it would be called),
whence the bay spread out before me like a picture, the white
islands edged with the whiter lacing of the waves. There, indeed,
was the fleet, but far away, like toy ships on the water, and the
bit of a fort perched on the sandy edge of an island. I spent most
of that day there, watching anxiously for some movement. But none
came.
That night I was again awakened. And running into the gallery, I
heard quick footsteps in the garden. Then there was a lantern’s
flash, a smothered oath, and all was dark again. But in the flash
I had seen distinctly three figures. One was Breed, and he held
the lantern; another was the master; and the third, a stout one
muffled in a cloak, I made no doubt was my jolly friend. I lay
long awake, with a boy’s curiosity, until presently the dawn
broke, and I arose and dressed, and began to wander about the
house. No Breed was sweeping the gallery, nor was there any sign
of the master. The house was as still as a tomb, and the echoes of
my footsteps rolled through the halls and chambers. At last,
prompted by curiosity and fear, I sought the kitchen, where I had
often sat with Breed as he cooked the master’s dinner. This was at
the bottom and end of the house. The great fire there was cold,
and the pots and pans hung neatly on their hooks, untouched that
day. I was running through the wet garden, glad to be out in the
light, when a sound stopped me.
It was a dull roar from the direction of the bay. Almost
instantly came another, and another, and then several broke
together. And I knew that the battle had begun. Forgetting for the
moment my loneliness, I ran into the house and up the stairs two
at a time, and up the ladder into the cupola, where I flung open
the casement and leaned out.
There was the battle indeed, — a sight so vivid to me after all
these years that I can call it again before me when I will. The
toy men-o’-war, with sails set, ranging in front of the fort. They
looked at my distance to be pressed against it. White puffs, like
cotton balls, would dart one after another from a ship’s side,
melt into a cloud, float over her spars, and hide her from my
view. And then presently the roar would reach me, and answering
puffs along the line of the fort. And I could see the mortar
shells go up and up, leaving a scorched trail behind, curve in a
great circle, and fall upon the little garrison. Mister Moultrie
became a real person to me then, a vivid picture in my boyish
mind — a hero beyond all other heroes.
As the sun got up in the heavens and the wind fell, the cupola
became a bake-oven. But I scarcely felt the heat. My whole soul
was out in the bay, pent up with the men in the fort. How long
could they hold out? Why were they not all killed by the shot that
fell like hail among them? Yet puff after puff sprang from their
guns, and the sound of it was like a storm coming nearer in the
heat. But at noon it seemed to me as though some of the ships were
sailing. It was true. Slowly they drew away from the others, and
presently I thought they had stopped again. Surely two of them
were stuck together, then three were fast on a shoal. Boats, like
black bugs in the water, came and went between them and the
others. After a long time the two that were together got apart and
away. But the third stayed there, immovable, helpless.
Throughout the afternoon the fight, kept on, the little black
boats coming and going. I saw a mast totter and fall on one of the
ships. I saw the flag shot away from the fort, and reappear again.
But now the puffs came from her walls slowly and more slowly, so
that my heart sank with the setting sun. And presently it grew too
dark to see aught save the red flashes. Slowly, reluctantly, the
noise died down until at last a great silence reigned, broken only
now and again by voices in the streets below me. It was not until
then that I realized that I had been all day without food — that I
was alone in the dark of a great house.
I had never known fear in the woods at night. But now I trembled
as I felt my way down the ladder, and groped and stumbled through
the black attic for the stairs. Every noise I made seemed louder
an hundred fold than the battle had been, and when I barked my
shins, the pain was sharper than a knife. Below, on the big
stairway, the echo of my footsteps sounded again from the empty
rooms, so that I was taken with a panic and fled downward, sliding
and falling, until I reached the hall. Frantically as I tried, I
could not unfasten the bolts on the front door. And so, running
into the drawing-room, I pried open the window, and sat me down in
the embrasure to think, and to try to quiet the thumpings of my
heart.
By degrees I succeeded. The still air of the night and the
heavy, damp odors of the foliage helped me. And I tried to think
what was right for me to do. I had promised the master not to
leave the place, and that promise seemed in pledge to my father.
Surely the master would come back — or Breed. They would not leave
me here alone without food much longer. Although I was young, I
was brought up to responsibility. And I inherited a conscience
that has since given me much trouble.
From these thoughts, trying enough for a starved lad, I fell to
thinking of my father on the frontier fighting the Cherokees. And
so I dozed away to dream of him. I remember that he was skinning
Cameron, — I had often pictured it, — and Cameron yelling, when I was
awakened with a shock by a great noise.
I listened with my heart in my throat. The noise seemed to come
from the hall, — a prodigious pounding. Presently it stopped, and a
man’s voice cried out: —
“Ho there, within!”
My first impulse was to answer. But fear kept me still.
“Batter down the door,” some one shouted.
There was a sound of shuffling in the portico, and the same
voice: —
“Now then, all together, lads!”
Then came a straining and splitting of wood, and with a crash
the door gave way. A lantern’s rays shot through the hall.
“The house is as dark as a tomb,” said a voice.
“And as empty, I reckon,” said another. "John Temple and his spy
have got away.”
“We’ll have a search,” answered the first voice.
They stood for a moment in the drawing-room door, peering, and
then they entered. There were five of them. Two looked to be
gentlemen, and three were of rougher appearance. They carried
lanterns.
“That window’s open,” said one of the gentlemen. "They must have
been here to-day. Hello, what’s this?” He started back in
surprise.
I slid down from the window-seat, and stood facing them, not
knowing what else to do. They, too, seemed equally confounded.
“It must be Temple’s son,” said one, at last. "I had thought the
family at Temple Bow. What’s your name, my lad?”
“David Trimble, sir,” said I.
“And what are you doing here?” he asked more sternly.
“I was left in Mr. Temple’s care by my father.”
“Oho!” he cried. "And where is your father?”
“He’s gone to fight the Cherokees,” I answered soberly. "To skin
a man named Cameron.”
At that they were silent for an instant, and then the two broke
into a laugh.
“Egad, Lowndes,” said the gentleman, “here is a fine mystery. Do
you think the boy is lying?”
The other gentleman scratched his forehead.
“I’ll have you know I don’t lie, sir,” I said, ready to cry.
“No,” said the other gentleman. "A backwoodsman named Trimble
went to Rutledge with credentials from North Carolina, and has
gone off to Cherokee Ford to join McCall.”
“Bless my soul!” exclaimed the first gentleman. He came up and
laid his hand on my shoulder, and said: —
“Where is Mr. Temple?”
“That I don’t know, sir.”
“When did he go away?”
I did not answer at once.
“That I can’t tell you, sir.”
“Was there any one with him?”
“That I can’t tell you, sir.”
“The devil you can’t!” he cried, taking his hand away. "And why
not?”
I shook my head, sorely beset.
“Come, Mathews,” cried the gentleman called Lowndes.
“We’ll search first, and attend to the lad after.”
And so they began going through the house, prying into every
cupboard and sweeping under every bed. They even climbed to the
attic; and noting the open casement in the cupola, Mr. Lowndes
said: —
“Some one has been here to-day.”
“It was I, sir,” I said. "I have been here all day.”
“And what doing, pray?” he demanded.
“Watching the battle. And oh, sir,” I cried, “can you tell me
whether Mister Moultrie beat the British?”
“He did so,” cried Mr. Lowndes. "He did, and soundly.”
He stared at me. I must have looked my pleasure.
“Why, David,” says he, “you are a patriot, too.”
“I am a Rebel, sir,” I cried hotly.
Both gentlemen laughed again, and the men with them.
“The lad is a character,” said Mr. Lowndes.
We made our way down into the garden, which they searched last.
At the creek’s side the boat was gone, and there were footsteps in
the mud.
“The bird has flown, Lowndes,” said Mr. Mathews.
“And good riddance for the Committee,” answered that gentleman,
heartily. "He got to the fleet in fine season to get a round shot
in the middle. David,” said he, solemnly, “remember it never pays
to try to be two things at once.”
“I’ll warrant he stayed below water,” said Mr. Mathews.
“But what shall we do with the lad?”
“I’ll take him to my house for the night,” said Mr. Lowndes,
"and in the morning we’ll talk to him. I reckon he should be sent
to Temple Bow. He is connected in some way with the Temples.”
“God help him if he goes there,” said Mr. Mathews, under his
breath. But I heard him.
They locked up the house, and left one of the men to guard it,
while I went with Mr. Lowndes to his residence. I remember that
people were gathered in the streets as we passed, making merry,
and that they greeted Mr. Lowndes with respect and good cheer. His
house, too, was set in a garden and quite as fine as Mr. Temple’s.
It was ablaze with candles, and I caught glimpses of fine
gentlemen and ladies in the rooms. But he hurried me through the
hall, and into a little chamber at the rear where a writing-desk
was set. He turned and faced me.
“You must be tired, David,” he said.
I nodded.
“And hungry? Boys are always hungry.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You had no dinner?”
“No, sir,” I answered, off my guard.
“Mercy!” he said. "It is a long time since breakfast.”
“I had no breakfast, sir.”
“Good God!” he said, and pulled the velvet handle of a cord. A
negro came.
“Is the supper for the guests ready?”
“Yes, Marsa.”
“Then bring as much as you can carry here,” said the gentleman.
"And ask Mrs. Lowndes if I may speak with her.”
Mrs. Lowndes came first. And such a fine lady she was that she
frightened me, this being my first experience with ladies. But
when Mr. Lowndes told her my story, she ran to me impulsively and
put her arms about me.
“Poor lad!” she said. "What a shame!”
I think that the tears came then, but it was small wonder. There
were tears in her eyes, too.
Such a supper as I had I shall never forget. And she sat beside
me for long, neglecting her guests, and talking of my life.
Suddenly she turned to her husband, calling him by name.
“He is Alec Ritchie’s son,” she said, “and Alec has gone against
Cameron.”
Mr. Lowndes did not answer, but nodded.
“And must he go to Temple Bow?”
“My dear,” said Mr. Lowndes, “I fear it is our duty to send him
there.”
In the morning I started for Temple Bow on horseback behind one
of Mr. Lowndes’ negroes. Good Mrs. Lowndes had kissed me at
parting, and tucked into my pocket a parcel of sweetmeats. There
had been a few grave gentlemen to see me, and to their questions I
had replied what I could. But tell them of Mr. Temple I would not,
save that he himself had told me nothing. And Mr. Lowndes had
presently put an end to their talk.
“The lad knows nothing, gentlemen,” he had said, which was true.
“David,” said he, when he bade me farewell, “I see that your
father has brought you up to fear God. Remember that all you see
in this life is not to be imitated.”
And so I went off behind his negro. He was a merry lad, and
despite the great heat of the journey and my misgivings about
Temple Bow, he made me laugh. I was sad at crossing the ferry over
the Ashley, through thinking of my father, but I reflected that it
could not be long now ere I saw him again. In the middle of the
day we stopped at a tavern. And at length, in the abundant shade
of evening, we came to a pair of great ornamental gates set
between brick pillars capped with white balls, and turned into a
drive. And presently, winding through the trees, we were in sight
of a long, brick mansion trimmed with white, and a velvet lawn
before it all flecked with shadows. In front of the portico was a
saddled horse, craning his long neck at two panting hounds
stretched on the ground. A negro boy in blue clutched the bridle.
On the horse-block a gentleman in white reclined. He wore shiny
boots, and he held his hat in his hand, and he was gazing up at a
lady who stood on the steps above him.
The lady I remember as well — Lord forbid that I should forget
her. And her laugh as I heard it that evening is ringing now in my
ears. And yet it was not a laugh. Musical it was, yet there seemed
no pleasure in it: rather irony, and a great weariness of the
amusements of this world: and a note, too, from a vanity never
ruffled. It stopped abruptly as the negro pulled up his horse
before her, and she stared at us haughtily.
“What’s this?” she said.
“Pardon, Mistis,” said the negro, “I’se got a letter from Marse
Lowndes.”
“Mr. Lowndes should instruct his niggers,” she said. "There is a
servants’ drive.” The man was turning his horse when she cried:
"Hold! Let’s have it.”
He dismounted and gave her the letter, and I jumped to the
ground, watching her as she broke the seal, taking her in, as a
boy will, from the flowing skirt and tight-laced stays of her
salmon silk to her high and powdered hair. She must have been
about thirty. Her face was beautiful, but had no particle of
expression in it, and was dotted here and there with little black
patches of plaster. While she was reading, a sober gentleman in
black silk-breeches and severe coat came out of the house and
stood beside her.
“Heigho, parson,” said the gentleman on the horse-block, without
moving, “are you to preach against loo or lansquenet to-morrow?”
“Would it make any difference to you, Mr. Riddle?”
Before he could answer there came a great clatter behind them,
and a boy of my own age appeared. With a leap he landed sprawling
on the indolent gentleman’s shoulders, nearly upsetting him.
“You young rascal!” exclaimed the gentleman, pitching him on the
drive almost at my feet; then he fell back again to a position
where he could look up at the lady.
“Harry Riddle,” cried the boy, “I’ll ride steeplechases and beat
you some day.”
“Hush, Nick,” cried the lady, petulantly, “I’ll have no nerves
left me.” She turned to the letter again, holding it very near to
her eyes, and made a wry face of impatience. Then she held the
sheet out to Mr. Riddle.
“A pretty piece of news,” she said languidly. "Read it, Harry.”
The gentleman seized her hand instead. The lady glanced at the
clergyman, whose back was turned, and shook her head.
“How tiresome you are!” she said.
“What’s happened?” asked Mr. Riddle, letting go as the parson
looked around.
“Oh, they’ve had a battle,” said the lady, “and Moultrie and his
Rebels have beat off the King’s fleet.”
“The devil they have!” exclaimed Mr. Riddle, while the parson
started forwards. "Anything more?”
“Yes, a little.” She hesitated. "That husband of mine has fled
Charlestown. They think he went to the fleet.” And she shot a
meaning look at Mr. Riddle, who in turn flushed red. I was
watching them.
“What!” cried the clergyman, “John Temple has run away?”
“Why not,” said Mr. Riddle. "One can’t live between wind and
water long. And Charlestown’s — uncomfortable in summer.”
At that the clergyman cast one look at them — such a look as I
shall never forget — and went into the house.
“Mamma,” said the boy, “where has father gone? Has he run away?”
“Yes. Don’t bother me, Nick.”
“I don’t believe it,” cried Nick, his high voice shaking.
"I’d — I’d disown him.”
At that Mr. Riddle burst into a hearty laugh.
“Come, Nick,” said he, “it isn’t so bad as that. Your father’s
for his Majesty, like the rest of us. He’s merely gone over to
fight for him.” And he looked at the lady and laughed again. But I
liked the boy.
As for the lady, she curled her lip. "Mr. Riddle, don’t be
foolish,” she said. "If we are to play, send your horse to the
stables.” Suddenly her eye lighted on me. "One more brat,” she
sighed. "Nick, take him to the nursery, or the stable. And both of
you keep out of my sight.”
Nick strode up to me.
“Don’t mind her. She’s always saying, ‘Keep out of my
sight.’”
His voice trembled. He took me by the sleeve and began pulling me
around the house and into a little summer bower that stood there;
for he had a masterful manner.
“What’s your name?” he demanded.
“David Trimble,” I said.
“Have you seen my father in town?”
The intense earnestness of the question surprised an answer out
of me.
“Yes.”
“Where?” he demanded.
“In his house. My father left me with your father.”
“Tell me about it.”
I related as much as I dared, leaving out Mr. Temple’s double
dealing; which, in truth, I did not understand. But the boy was
relentless.
“Why,” said he, “my father was a friend of Mr. Lowndes and Mr.
Mathews. I have seen them here drinking with him. And in town. And
he ran away?”
“I do not know where he went,” said I, which was the truth.
He said nothing, but hid his face in his arms over the rail of
the bower. At length he looked up at me fiercely.
“If you ever tell this, I will kill you,” he cried. "Do you
hear?”
That made me angry.
“Yes, I hear,” I said. "But I am not afraid of you.”
He was at me in an instant, knocking me to the floor, so that
the breath went out of me, and was pounding me vigorously ere I
recovered from the shock and astonishment of it and began to
defend myself. He was taller than I, and wiry, but not so rugged.
Yet there was a look about him that was far beyond his strength. A
look that meant, never say die. Curiously, even as I fought
desperately I compared him with that other lad I had known, Andy
Jackson. And this one, though not so powerful, frightened me the
more in his relentlessness.
Perhaps we should have been fighting still had not some one
pulled us apart, and when my vision cleared I saw Nick, struggling
and kicking, held tightly in the hands of the clergyman. And it
was all that gentleman could do to hold him. I am sure it was
quite five minutes before he forced the lad, exhausted, on to the
seat. And then there was a defiance about his nostrils that showed
he was undefeated. The clergyman, still holding him with one hand,
took out his handkerchief with the other and wiped his brow.
I expected a scolding and a sermon. To my amazement the
clergyman said quietly: —
“Now what was the trouble, David?”
“I’ll not be the one to tell it, sir,” I said, and trembled at
my temerity.
The parson looked at me queerly.
“Then you are in the right of it,” he said. "It is as I thought;
I’ll not expect Nicholas to tell me.”
“I will tell you, sir,” said Nicholas. "He was in the house with
my father when — when he ran away. And I said that if he ever spoke
of it to any one, I would kill him.”
For a while the clergyman was silent, gazing with a strange
tenderness at the lad, whose face was averted.
“And you, David?” he said presently.
“I — I never mean to tell, sir. But I was not to be frightened.”
“Quite right, my lad,” said the clergyman, so kindly that it
sent a strange thrill through me. Nicholas looked up quickly.
“You won’t tell?” he said.
“No,” I said.
“You can let me go now, Mr. Mason,” said he. Mr. Mason did. And
he came over and sat beside me, but said nothing more.
After a while Mr. Mason cleared his throat.
“Nicholas,” said he, “when you grow older you will understand
these matters better. Your father went away to join the side he
believes in, the side we all believe in — the King’s side.”
“Did he ever pretend to like the other side?” asked Nick,
quickly.
“When you grow older you will know his motives,” answered the
clergyman, gently. "Until then; you must trust him.”
“You never pretended,” cried Nick.
“Thank God I never was forced to do so,” said the clergyman,
fervently.
It is wonderful that the conditions of our existence may wholly
change without a seeming strangeness. After many years only vivid
snatches of what I saw and heard and did at Temple Bow come back
to me. I understood but little the meaning of the seigniorial life
there. My chief wonder now is that its golden surface was not more
troubled by the winds then brewing. It was a new life to me, one
that I had not dreamed of.
After that first falling out, Nick and I became inseparable. Far
slower than he in my likes and dislikes, he soon became a passion
with me. Even as a boy, he did everything with a grace
unsurpassed; the dash and daring of his pranks took one’s breath;
his generosity to those he loved was prodigal. Nor did he ever
miss a chance to score those under his displeasure. At times he
was reckless beyond words to describe, and again he would fall
sober for a day. He could be cruel and tender in the same hour;
abandoned and freezing in his dignity. He had an old negro mammy
whose worship for him and his possessions was idolatry. I can hear
her now calling and calling, “Marse Nick, honey, yo’ supper’s done
got cole,” as she searched patiently among the magnolias. And
suddenly there would be a shout, and Mammy’s turban go flying from
her woolly head, or Mammy herself would be dragged down from
behind and sat upon.
We had our supper, Nick and I, at twilight, in the children’s
dining room. A little white room, unevenly panelled, the silver
candlesticks and yellow flames fantastically reflected in the
mirrors between the deep windows, and the moths and June-bugs
tilting at the lights. We sat at a little mahogany table eating
porridge and cream from round blue bowls, with Mammy to wait on
us. Sometimes there floated in upon us the hum of revelry from the
great drawing-room where Madame had her company. Often the good
Mr. Mason would come in to us (he cared little for the parties),
and talk to us of our day’s doings. Nick had his lessons from the
clergyman in the winter time.
Mr. Mason took occasion once to question me on what I knew. Some
of my answers, in especial those relating to my knowledge of the
Bible, surprised him. Others made him sad.
“David,” said he, “you are an earnest lad, with a head to learn,
and you will. When your father comes, I shall talk with him.” He
paused — "I knew him,” said he, “I knew him ere you were born. A
just man, and upright, but with a great sorrow. We must never be
hasty in our judgments. But you will never be hasty, David,” he
added, smiling at me. "You are a good companion for Nicholas.”
Nicholas and I slept in the same bedroom, at a corner of the
long house, and far removed from his mother. She would not be
disturbed by the noise he made in the mornings. I remember that he
had cut in the solid shutters of that room, folded into the
embrasures,
“Nicholas Temple, His Mark,”
and a long, flat sword.
The first night in that room we slept but little, near the whole
of it being occupied with tales of my adventures and of my life in
the mountains. Over and over again I must tell him of the
"painters" and wildcats, of deer and bear and wolf. Nor was he
ever satisfied. And at length I came to speak of that land where I
had often lived in fancy — the land beyond the mountains of which
Daniel Boone had told. Of its forest and glade, its countless
herds of elk and buffalo, its salt-licks and Indians, until we
fell asleep from sheer exhaustion.
“I will go there,” he cried in the morning, as he hurried into
his clothes; "I will go to that land as sure as my name is Nick
Temple. And you shall go with me, David.”
“Perchance I shall go before you,” I answered, though I had
small hopes of persuading my father.
He would often make his exit by the window, climbing down into
the garden by the protruding bricks at the corner of the house; or
sometimes go shouting down the long halls and through the gallery
to the great stairway, a smothered oath from behind the closed
bedroom doors proclaiming that he had waked a guest. And many days
we spent in the wood, playing at hunting game — a poor enough
amusement for me, and one that Nick soon tired of. They were
thick, wet woods, unlike our woods of the mountains; and more than
once we had excitement enough with the snakes that lay there.
I believe that in a week’s time Nick was as conversant with my
life as I myself. For he made me tell of it again and again, and
of Kentucky. And always as he listened his eyes would glow and his
breast heave with excitement.
“Do you think your father will take you there, David, when he
comes for you?”
I hoped so, but was doubtful.
“I’ll run away with you,” he declared. "There is no one here who
cares for me save Mr. Mason and Mammy.”
And I believe he meant it. He saw but little of his mother, and
nearly always something unpleasant was coupled with his views.
Sometimes we ran across her in the garden paths walking with a
gallant, — oftenest Mr. Riddle. It was a beautiful garden, with
hedge-bordered walks and flowers wondrously massed in color, a
high brick wall surrounding it. Frequently Mrs. Temple and Mr.
Riddle would play at cards there of an afternoon, and when that
musical, unbelieving laugh of hers came floating over the wall,
Nick would say: —
“Mamma is winning.”
Once we heard high words between the two, and running into the
garden found the cards scattered on the grass, and the couple
gone.
Of all Nick’s escapades, — and he was continually in and out of
them, — I recall only a few of the more serious. As I have said, he
was a wild lad, sobered by none of the things which had gone to
make my life, and what he took into his head to do he generally
did, — or, if balked, flew into such a rage as to make one believe
he could not live. Life was always war with him, or some semblance
of a struggle. Of his many wild doings I recall well the time
when — fired by my tales of hunting — he went out to attack the young
bull in the paddock with a bow and arrow. It made small difference
to the bull that the arrow was too blunt to enter his hide. With a
bellow that frightened the idle negroes at the slave quarters, he
started for Master Nick. I, who had been taught by my father never
to run any unnecessary risk, had taken the precaution to provide
as large a stone as I could comfortably throw, and took station on
the fence. As the furious animal came charging, with his head
lowered, I struck him by a good fortune between the eyes, and
Nicholas got over. We were standing on the far side, watching him
pawing the broken bow, when, in the crowd of frightened negroes,
we discovered the parson beside us.
“David,” said he, patting me with a shaking hand, “I perceive
that you have a cool head. Our young friend here has a hot one.
Dr. Johnson may not care for Scotch blood, and yet I think a wee
bit of it is not to be despised.”
I wondered whether Dr. Johnson was staying in the house, too.
How many slaves there were at Temple Bow I know not, but we used
to see them coming home at night in droves, the overseers riding
beside them with whips and guns. One day a huge Congo chief, not
long from Africa, nearly killed an overseer, and escaped to the
swamp. As the day fell, we heard the baying of the bloodhounds hot
upon his trail. More ominous still, a sound like a rising wind
came from the direction of the quarters. Into our little
dining-room burst Mrs. Temple herself, slamming the door behind
her. Mr. Mason, who was sitting with us, rose to calm her.
“The Rebels!” she cried. "The Rebels have taught them this, with
their accursed notions of liberty and equality. We shall all be
murdered by the blacks because of the Rebels. Oh, hell-fire is too
good for them. Have the house barred and a watch set to-night.
What shall we do?”
“I pray you compose yourself, Madame,” said the clergyman. "We
can send for the militia.”
“The militia!” she shrieked; "the Rebel militia! They would
murder us as soon as the niggers.”
“They are respectable men,” answered Mr. Mason, “and were at
Fanning Hall to-day patrolling.”
“I would rather be killed by whites than blacks,” said the lady.
"But who is to go for the militia?”
“I will ride for them,” said Mr. Mason. It was a dark, lowering
night, and spitting rain.
“And leave me defenceless!” she cried. "You do not stir, sir.”
“It is a pity,” said Mr. Mason — he was goaded to it, I
suppose — "’tis a pity Mr. Riddle did not come to-night.”
She shot at him a withering look, for even in her fear she would
brook no liberties. Nick spoke up: —
“I will go,” said he; "I can get through the woods to Fanning
Hall — "
“And I will go with him,” I said.
“Let the brats go,” she said, and cut short Mr. Mason’s
expostulations. She drew Nick to her and kissed him. He wriggled
away, and without more ado we climbed out of the dining-room
windows into the night. Running across the lawn, we left the
lights of the great house twinkling behind us in the rain. We had
to pass the long line of cabins at the quarters. Three overseers
with lanterns stood guard there; the cabins were dark, the
wretches within silent and cowed. Thence we felt with our feet for
the path across the fields, stumbled over a sty, and took our way
through the black woods. I was at home here, and Nick was not to
be frightened. At intervals the mournful bay of a bloodhound came
to us from a distance.
“Suppose we should meet the Congo chief,” said Nick, suddenly.
The idea had occurred to me.
“She needn’t have been so frightened,” said he, in scornful
remembrance of his mother’s actions.
We pressed on. Nick knew the path as only a boy can. Half an
hour passed. It grew brighter. The rain ceased, and a new moon
shot out between the leaves. I seized his arm.
“What’s that?” I whispered.
“A deer.”
But I, cradled in woodcraft, had heard plainly a man creeping
through the underbrush beside us. Fear of the Congo chief and pity
for the wretch tore at my heart. Suddenly there loomed in front of
us, on the path, a great, naked man. We stood with useless limbs,
staring at him.
Then, from the trees over our heads, came a chittering and a
chattering such as I had never heard. The big man before us
dropped to the earth, his head bowed, muttering. As for me, my
fright increased. The chattering stopped, and Nick stepped forward
and laid his hand on the negro’s bare shoulder.
“We needn’t be afraid of him now, Davy,” he said. "I learned
that trick from a Portuguese overseer we had last year.”
“You did it!” I exclaimed, my astonishment overcoming my fear.
“It’s the way the monkeys chatter in the Canaries,” he said.
"Manuel had a tame one, and I heard it talk. Once before I tried
it on the chief, and he fell down. He thinks I’m a god.”
It must have been a weird scene to see the great negro following
two boys in the moonlight. Indeed, he came after us like a dog. At
length we were in sight of the lights of Fanning Hall. The militia
was there. We were challenged by the guard, and caused sufficient
amazement when we appeared in the hall before the master, who was
a bachelor of fifty.
“’Sblood, Nick Temple!” he cried, “what are you doing here with
that big Congo for a dog? The sight of him frightens me.”
The negro, indeed, was a sight to frighten one. The black mud of
the swamps was caked on him, and his flesh was torn by brambles.
“He ran away,” said Nick; "and I am taking him home.”
“You — you are taking him home!” sputtered Mr. Fanning.
“Do you want to see him act?” said Nick. And without waiting for
a reply he filled the hall with a dozen monkeys. Mr. Fanning
leaped back into a doorway, but the chief prostrated himself on
the floor. "Now do you believe I can take him home?” said Nick.
“’Swounds!” said Mr. Fanning, when he had his breath. "You beat
the devil, Nicholas Temple. The next time you come to call I pray
you leave your travelling show at home.”
“Mamma sent me for the militia,” said Nick.
“She did!” said Mr. Fanning, looking grim. "An insurrection is a
bad thing, but there was no danger for two lads in the woods, I
suppose.”
“There’s no danger anyway,” said Nick. "The niggers are all
scared to death.”
Mr. Fanning burst out into a loud laugh, stopped suddenly, sat
down, and took Nick on his knee. It was an incongruous scene. Mr.
Fanning almost cried.
“Bless your soul,” he said, “but you are a lad. Would to God I
had you instead of — "
He paused abruptly.
“I must go home,” said Nick; "she will be worried.”
“She will be worried!” cried Mr. Fanning, in a burst of anger.
Then he said: "You shall have the militia. You shall have the
militia.” He rang a bell and sent his steward for the captain, a
gawky country farmer, who gave a gasp when he came upon the scene
in the hall.
“And mind,” said Nick to the captain, “you are to keep your men
away from him, or he will kill one of them.”
The captain grinned at him curiously.
“I reckon I won’t have to tell them to keep away,” said he.
Mr. Fanning started us off for the walk with pockets filled with
sweetmeats, which we nibbled on the way back. We made a queer
procession, Nick and I striding ahead to show the path, followed
by the now servile chief, and after him the captain and his twenty
men in single file. It was midnight when we saw the lights of
Temple Bow through the trees. One of the tired overseers met us
near the kitchen. When he perceived the Congo his face lighted up
with rage, and he instinctively reached for his whip. But the
chief stood before him, immovable, with arms folded, and a look on
his face that meant danger.
“He will kill you, Emory,” said Nick; "he will kill you if you
touch him.”
Emory dropped his hand, limply.
“He will go to work in the morning,” said Nick; "but mind you,
not a lash.”
“Very good, Master Nick,” said the man; "but who’s to get him in
his cabin?”
“I will,” said Nick. He beckoned to the Congo, who followed him
over to quarters and went in at his door without a protest.
The next morning Mrs. Temple looked out of her window and saw
the militiamen on the lawn.
“Pooh!” she said, “are those butternuts the soldiers that Nick
went to fetch?”
AFTER that my admiration for Nick Temple increased greatly,
whether excited by his courage and presence of mind, or his
ability to imitate men and women and creatures, I know not. One of
our amusements, I recall, was to go to the Congo’s cabin to see
him fall on his face, until Mr. Mason put a stop to it. The
clergyman let us know that we were encouraging idolatry, and he
himself took the chief in hand.
Another incident comes to me from those bygone days. The fear of
negro insurrections at the neighboring plantations being
temporarily lulled, the gentry began to pluck up courage for their
usual amusements. There were to be races at some place a distance
away, and Nick was determined to go. Had he not determined that I
should go, all would have been well. The evening before he came
upon his mother in the garden. Strange to say, she was in a
gracious mood and alone.
“Come and kiss me, Nick,” she said. "Now, what do you want?”
“I want to go to the races,” he said.
“You have your pony. You can follow the coach.”
“David is to ride the pony,” said Nick, generously. "May I go in
the coach?”
“No,” she said, “there is no room for you.”
Nicholas flared up. "Harry Riddle is going in the coach. I don’t
see why you can’t take me sometimes. You like him better than me.”
The lady flushed very red.
“How dare you, Nick!” she cried angrily. "What has Mr. Mason
been putting into your head?”
“Nothing,” said Nick, quite as angrily. "Any one can see that
you like Harry. And I WILL ride in the coach.”
“You’ll not,” said his mother.
I had heard nothing of this. The next morning he led out his
pony from the stables for me to ride, and insisted. And, supposing
he was to go in the coach, I put foot in the stirrup. The little
beast would scarce stand still for me to mount.
“You’ll not need the whip with her,” said Nick, and led her
around by the side of the house, in view of the portico, and stood
there at her bridle. Presently, with a great noise and clatter of
hoofs, the coach rounded the drive, the powdered negro coachman
pulling up the four horses with much ceremony at the door. It was
a wondrous great vehicle, the bright colors of its body flashing
in the morning light. I had examined it more than once, and with
awe, in the coach-house. It had glass windows and a lion on a blue
shield on the door, and within it was all salmon silk, save the
painted design on the ceiling. Great leather straps held up this
house on wheels, to take the jolts of the road. And behind it was
a platform. That morning two young negroes with flowing blue coats
stood on it. They leaped to the ground when the coach stopped, and
stood each side of the door, waiting for my lady to enter.
She came down the steps, laughing, with Mr. Riddle, who was in
his riding clothes, for he was to race that day. He handed her in,
and got in after her. The coachman cracked his whip, the coach
creaked off down the drive, I in the trees one side waiting for
them to pass, and wondering what Nick was to do. He had let go my
bridle, folded his whip in his hand, and with a shout of "Come on,
Davy,” he ran for the coach, which was going slowly, caught hold
of the footman’s platform, and pulled himself up.
What possessed the footman I know not. Perchance fear of his
mistress was greater than fear of his young master; but he took
the lad by the shoulders — gently, to be sure — and pushed him into
the road, where he fell and rolled over. I guessed what would
happen. Picking himself up, Nick was at the man like a hurricane,
seizing him swiftly by the leg. The negro fell upon the platform,
clutching wildly, where he lay in a sheer fright, shrieking for
mercy, his cries rivalled by those of the lady within. The
coachman frantically pulled his horses to a stand, the other
footman jumped off, and Mr. Harry Riddle came flying out of the
coach door, to behold Nicholas beating the negro with his
riding-whip.
“You young devil,” cried Mr. Riddle, angrily, striding forward,
"what are you doing?”
“Keep off, Harry,” said Nicholas. "I am teaching this nigger
that he is not to lay hands on his betters.” With that he gave the
boy one more cut, and turned from him contemptuously.
“What is it, Harry?” came in a shrill voice from within the
coach.
“It’s Nick’s pranks,” said Mr. Riddle, grinning in spite of his
anger; "he’s ruined one of your footmen. You little scoundrel,”
cried Mr. Riddle, advancing again, “you’ve frightened your mother
nearly to a swoon.”
“Serves her right,” said Nick.
“What!” cried Mr. Riddle. "Come down from there instantly.”
Nick raised his whip. It was not that that stopped Mr. Riddle,
but a sign about the lad’s nostrils.
“Harry Riddle,” said the boy, “if it weren’t for you, I’d be
riding in this coach to-day with my mother. I don’t want to ride
with her, but I will go to the races. If you try to take me down,
I’ll do my best to kill you,” and he lifted the loaded end of the
whip.
Mrs. Temple’s beautiful face had by this time been thrust out of
the door.
“For the love of heaven, Harry, let him come in with us. We’re
late enough as it is.”
Mr. Riddle turned on his heel. He tried to glare at Nick, but he
broke into a laugh instead.
“Come down, Satan,” says he. "God help the woman you love and
the man you fight.”
And so Nicholas jumped down, and into the coach. The footman
picked himself up, more scared than injured, and the vehicle took
its lumbering way for the race-course, I following.
I have seen many courses since, but none to equal that in the
gorgeous dress of those who watched. There had been many, many
more in former years, so I heard people say. This was the only
sign that a war was in progress, — the scanty number of gentry
present, — for all save the indifferent were gone to Charlestown or
elsewhere. I recall it dimly, as a blaze of color passing:
merrymaking, jesting, feasting, — a rare contrast, I thought, to the
sight I had beheld in Charlestown Bay but a while before. Yet so
runs the world, — strife at one man’s home, and peace and
contentment at his neighbor’s; sorrow here, and rejoicing not a
league away.
Master Nicholas played one prank that evening that was near to
costing dear. My lady Temple made up a party for Temple Bow at the
course, two other coaches to come and some gentlemen riding. As
Nick and I were running through the paddock we came suddenly upon
Mr. Harry Riddle and a stout, swarthy gentleman standing together.
The stout gentleman was counting out big gold pieces in his hand
and giving them to Mr. Riddle.
“Lucky dog!” said the stout gentleman; "you’ll ride back with
her, and you’ve won all I’ve got.” And he dug Mr. Riddle in the
ribs.
“You’ll have it again when we play to-night, Darnley,” answered
Mr. Riddle, crossly. "And as for the seat in the coach, you are
welcome to it. That firebrand of a lad is on the front seat.”
“D—n the lad,” said the stout gentleman. "I’ll take it, and you
can ride my horse. He’ll — he’ll carry you, I reckon.” His voice had
a way of cracking into a mellow laugh.
At that Mr. Riddle went off in a towering bad humor, and
afterwards I heard him cursing the stout gentleman’s black groom
as he mounted his great horse. And then he cursed the horse as it
reared and plunged, while the stout gentleman stood at the coach
door, cackling at his discomfiture. The gentleman did ride home
with Mrs. Temple, Nick going into another coach. I afterwards
discovered that the gentleman had bribed him with a guinea. And
Mr. Riddle more than once came near running down my pony on his
big charger, and he swore at me roundly, too.
That night there was a gay supper party in the big dining room
at Temple Bow. Nick and I looked on from the gallery window. It
was a pretty sight. The long mahogany board reflecting the yellow
flames of the candles, and spread with bright silver and shining
dishes loaded with dainties, the gentlemen and ladies in brilliant
dress, the hurrying servants, — all were of a new and strange world
to me. And presently, after the ladies were gone, the gentlemen
tossed off their wine and roared over their jokes, and followed
into the drawing-room. This I noticed, that only Mr. Harry Riddle
sat silent and morose, and that he had drunk more than the others.
“Come, Davy,” said Nick to me, “let’s go and watch them again.”
“But how?” I asked, for the drawing-room windows were up some
distance from the ground, and there was no gallery on that side.
“I’ll show you,” said he, running into the garden. After
searching awhile in the dark, he found a ladder the gardener had
left against a tree; after much straining, we carried the ladder
to the house and set it up under one of the windows of the
drawing-room. Then we both clambered cautiously to the top and
looked in.
The company were at cards, silent, save for a low remark now and
again. The little tables were ranged along by the windows, and it
chanced that Mr. Harry Riddle sat so close to us that we could
touch him. On his right sat Mr. Darnley, the stout gentleman, and
in the other seats two ladies. Between Mr. Riddle and Mr. Darnley
was a pile of silver and gold pieces. There was not room for two
of us in comfort at the top of the ladder, so I gave place to
Nick, and sat on a lower rung. Presently I saw him raise himself,
reach in, and duck quickly.
“Feel that,” he whispered to me, chuckling and holding out his
hand.
It was full of money.
“But that’s stealing, Nick,” I said, frightened.
“Of course I’ll give it back,” he whispered indignantly.
Instantly there came loud words and the scraping of chairs
within the room, and a woman’s scream. I heard Mr. Riddle’s voice
say thickly, amid the silence that followed: —
“Mr. Darnley, you’re a D—d thief, sir.”
“You shall answer for this, when you are sober, sir,” said Mr.
Darnley.
Then there came more scraping of chairs, all the company talking
excitedly at once. Nick and I scrambled to the ground, and we did
the very worst thing we could possibly have done, — we took the
ladder away.
There was little sleep for me that night. I had first of all
besought Nick to go up into the drawing-room and give the money
back. But some strange obstinacy in him resisted.
“’Twill serve Harry well for what he did to-day,” said he.
My next thought was to find Mr. Mason, but he was gone up the
river to visit a sick parishioner. I had seen enough of the world
to know that gentlemen fought for less than what had occurred in
the drawing-room that evening. And though I had neither love nor
admiration for Mr. Riddle, and though the stout gentleman was no
friend of mine, I cared not to see either of them killed for a
prank. But Nick would not listen to me, and went to sleep in the
midst of my urgings.
“Davy,” said he, pinching me, “do you know what you are?”
“No,” said I.
“You’re a granny,” he said. And that was the last word I could
get out of him. But I lay awake a long time, thinking. Breed had
whiled away for me one hot morning in Charlestown with an account
of the gentry and their doings, many of which he related in an
awed whisper that I could not understand. They were wild doings
indeed to me. But strangest of all seemed the duels, conducted
with a decorum and ceremony as rigorous as the law.
“Did you ever see a duel, Breed?” I had asked.
“Yessah,” said Breed, dramatically, rolling the whites of his
eyes.
“Where?”
“Whah? Down on de riveh bank at Temple Bow in de ea’ly mo’nin’!
Dey mos’ commonly fights at de dawn.”
Breed had also told me where he was in hiding at the time, and
that was what troubled me. Try as I would, I could not remember.
It had sounded like Clam Shell. That I recalled, and how Breed had
looked out at the sword-play through the cracks of the closed
shutters, agonized between fear of ghosts within and the drama
without. At the first faint light that came into our window I
awakened Nick.
“Listen,” I said; "do you know a place called Clam Shell?”
He turned over, but I punched him persistently until he sat up.
“What the deuce ails you, Davy?” he asked, rubbing his eyes.
"Have you nightmare?”
“Do you know a place called Clam Shell, down on the river bank,
Nick?”
“Why,” he replied, “you must be thinking of Cram’s Hell.”
“What’s that?” I asked.
“It’s a house that used to belong to Cram, who was an overseer.
The niggers hated him, and he was killed in bed by a big black
nigger chief from Africa. The niggers won’t go near the place.
They say it’s haunted.”
“Get up,” said I; "we’re going there now.”
Nick sprang out of bed and began to get into his clothes.
“Is it a game?” he asked.
“Yes.” He was always ready for a game.
We climbed out of the window, and made our way in the mist
through the long, wet grass, Nick leading. He took a path through
a dark forest swamp, over logs that spanned the stagnant waters,
and at length, just as the mist was growing pearly in the light,
we came out at a tumble-down house that stood in an open glade by
the river’s bank.
“What’s to do now?” said Nick.
“We must get into the house,” I answered. But I confess I didn’t
care for the looks of it.
Nick stared at me.
“Very good, Davy,” he said; "I’ll follow where you go.”
It was a Saturday morning. Why I recall this I do not know. It
has no special significance.
I tried the door. With a groan and a shriek it gave way,
disclosing the blackness inside. We started back involuntarily. I
looked at Nick, and Nick at me. He was very pale, and so must I
have been. But such was the respect we each held for the other’s
courage that neither dared flinch. And so I walked in, although it
seemed as if my shirt was made of needle points and my hair stood
on end. The crackings of the old floor were to me like the shots
in Charlestown Bay. Our hearts beating wildly, we made our way
into a farther room. It was like walking into the beyond.
“Is there a window here?” I asked Nick, my voice sounding like a
shout.
“Yes, ahead of us.”
Groping for it, I suddenly received a shock that set me reeling.
Human nature could stand no more. We both turned tail and ran out
of the house as fast as we could, and stood in the wet grass,
panting. Then shame came.
“Let’s open the window first,” I suggested. So we walked around
the house and pried the solid shutter from its fastenings. Then,
gathering our courage, we went in again at the door. In the dim
light let into the farther room we saw a four-poster bed, old and
cheap, with ragged curtains. It was this that I had struck in my
groping.
“The chief killed Cram there,” said Nick, in an awed voice, “in
that bed. What do you want to do here, Davy?”
“Wait,” I said, though I had as little mind to wait as ever in
my life. "Stand here by the window.”
We waited there. The mist rose. The sun peeped over the bank of
dense green forest and spread rainbow colors on the still waters
of the river. Now and again a fish broke, or a great bird swooped
down and slit the surface. A far-off snatch of melody came to our
ears, — the slaves were going to work. Nothing more. And little by
little grave misgivings gnawed at my soul of the wisdom of coming
to this place. Doubtless there were many other spots.
“Davy,” said Nick, at last, “I’m sorry I took that money. What
are we here for?”
“Hush!” I whispered; "do you hear anything?”
I did, and distinctly. For I had been brought up in the forest.
“I hear voices,” he said presently, “coming this way.”
They were very clear to me by then. Emerging from the forest
path were five gentlemen. The leader, more plainly dressed than
the others, carried a leather case. Behind him was the stout
figure of Mr. Darnley, his face solemn; and last of all came Mr.
Harry Riddle, very pale, but cutting the tops of the long grass
with a switch. Nick seized my arm.
“They are going to fight,” said he.
“Yes,” I replied, “and we are here to stop them, now.”
“No, not now,” he said, holding me still. "We’ll have some more
fun out of this yet.”
“Fun?” I echoed.
“Yes,” he said excitedly. "Leave it to me. I shan’t let them
fight.”
And that instant we changed generals, David giving place to
Nicholas.
Mr. Riddle retired with one gentleman to a side of the little
patch of grass, and Mr. Darnley and a friend to another. The fifth
gentleman took a position halfway between the two, and, opening
the leather case, laid it down on the grass, where its contents
glistened.
“That’s Dr. Ball,” whispered Nick. And his voice shook with
excitement.
Mr. Riddle stripped off his coat and waistcoat and ruffles, and
his sword-belt, and Mr. Darnley did the same. Both gentlemen drew
their swords and advanced to the middle of the lawn, and stood
opposite one another, with flowing linen shirts open at the
throat, and bared heads. They were indeed a contrast. Mr. Riddle,
tall and white, with closed lips, glared at his opponent. Mr.
Darnley cut a merrier figure, — rotund and flushed, with fat calves
and short arms, though his countenance was sober enough. All at
once the two were circling their swords in the air, and then Nick
had flung open the shutter and leaped through the window, and was
running and shouting towards the astonished gentlemen, all of whom
wheeled to face him. He jingled as he ran.
“What in the devil’s name now?” cried Mr. Riddle, angrily.
"Here’s this imp again.”
Nicholas stopped in front of him, and, thrusting his hand in his
breeches pocket, fished out a handful of gold and silver, which he
held out to the confounded Mr. Riddle.
“Harry,” said he, “here’s something of yours I found last
night.”
“You found?” echoed Mr. Riddle, in a strange voice, amidst a
dead silence. "You found where?”
“On the table beside you.”
“And where the deuce were you?” Mr. Riddle demanded.
“In the window behind you,” said Nick, calmly.
This piece of information, to Mr. Riddle’s plain discomfiture,
was greeted with a roar of laughter, Mr. Darnley himself laughing
loudest. Nor were these gentlemen satisfied with that. They
crowded around Mr. Riddle and slapped him on the back, Mr. Darnley
joining in with the rest. And presently Mr. Riddle flung away his
sword, and laughed, too, giving his hand to Mr. Darnley.
At length Mr. Darnley turned to Nick, who had stood all this
while behind them, unmoved.
“My friend,” said he, seriously, “such is your regard for human
life, you will probably one day — be a pirate or an outlaw. This
time we’ve had a laugh. The next time somebody will be weeping. I
wish I were your father.”
“I wish you were,” said Nick.
This took Mr. Darnley’s breath. He glanced at the other
gentlemen, who returned his look significantly. He laid his hand
kindly on the lad’s head.
“Nick,” said he, “I wish to God I were your father.”
After that they all went home, very merry, to breakfast, Nick
and I coming after them. Nick was silent until we reached the
house.
“Davy,” said he, then, “how old are you?”
“Ten,” I answered. "How old did you believe me?”
“Eighty,” said he.
The next day, being Sunday, we all gathered in the little church
to hear Mr. Mason preach. Nick and I sat in the high box pew of
the family with Mrs. Temple, who paid not the least attention to
the sermon. As for me, the rhythm of it held me in fascination.
Mr. Mason had written it out and that afternoon read over this
part of it to Nick. The quotation I recall, having since read it
many times, and the gist of it was in this wise: —
“And he said unto him, ’What thou wilt have thou wilt have,
despite the sin of it. Blessed are the stolid, and thrice cursed
he who hath imagination, — for that imagination shall devour him.
And in thy life a sin shall be presented unto thee with a great
longing. God, who is in heaven, gird thee for that struggle, my
son, for it will surely come. That it may be said of you, “Behold,
I have refined thee, but not with silver, I have chosen thee in
the furnace of affliction.” Seven days shalt thou wrestle with thy
soul; seven nights shall evil haunt thee, and how thou shalt come
forth from that struggle no man may know.’"
CHAPTER VI.
man proposes, but god disposes
A WEEK passed, and another Sunday came, — a Sunday so still and
hot and moist that steam seemed to rise from the heavy trees, — an
idle day for master and servant alike. A hush was in the air, and
a presage of we knew not what. It weighed upon my spirits, and
even Nick’s, and we wandered restlessly under the trees, seeking
for distraction.
About two o’clock a black line came on the horizon, and slowly
crept higher until it broke into giant, fantastic shapes.
Mutterings arose, but the sun shone hot as ever.
“We’re to have a hurricane,” said Nick. "I wish we might have it
and be done with it.”
At five the sun went under. I remember that Madame was lolling
listless in the garden, daintily arrayed in fine linen, trying to
talk to Mr. Mason, when a sound startled us. It was the sound of
swift hoof beats on the soft drive.
Mrs. Temple got up, an unusual thing. Perchance she was
expecting a message from some of the gentlemen; or else she may
well have been tired of Mr. Mason. Nick and I were before her,
and, running through the house, arrived at the portico in time to
see a negro ride up on a horse covered with lather.
It was the same negro who had fetched me hither from Mr.
Lowndes. And when I saw him my heart stood still lest he had
brought news of my father.
“What’s to do, boy?” cried Nicholas to him.
The boy held in his hand a letter with a great red seal.
“Fo’ Mistis Temple,” he said, and, looking at me queerly, he
took off his cap as he jumped from the horse. Mistress Temple
herself having arrived, he handed her the letter. She took it, and
broke the seal carelessly.
“Oh,” she said, “it’s only from Mr. Lowndes. I wonder what he
wishes now.”
Every moment of her reading was for me an agony, and she read
slowly. The last words she spoke aloud: —
“’If you do not wish the lad, send him to me, as Kate is very
fond of him.’ So Kate is very fond of him,” she repeated. And
handing the letter to Mr. Mason, she added, “Tell him, Parson.”
The words burned into my soul and seared it. And to this day I
tremble with anger as I think of them. The scene comes before me:
the sky, the darkened portico, and Nicholas running after his
mother crying: "Oh, mamma, how could you! How could you!”
Mr. Mason bent over me in compassion, and smoothed my hair.
“David,” said he, in a thick voice, “you are a brave boy, David.
You will need all your courage now, my son. May God keep your
nature sweet!”
He led me gently into the arbor and told me how, under Captain
Baskin, the detachment had been ambushed by the Cherokees; and how
my father, with Ensign Calhoun and another, had been killed,
fighting bravely. The rest of the company had cut their way
through and reached the settlements after terrible hardships.
I was left an orphan.
I shall not dwell here on the bitterness of those moments. We
have all known sorrows in our lives, — great sorrows. The clergyman
was a wise man, and did not strive to comfort me with words. But
he sat there under the leaves with his arm about me until a
blinding bolt split the blackness of the sky and the thunder rent
our ears, and a Caribbean storm broke over Temple Bow with all the
fury of the tropics. Then he led me through the drenching rain
into the house, nor heeded the wet himself on his Sunday coat.
A great anger stayed me in my sorrow. I would no longer tarry
under Mrs. Temple’s roof, though the world without were a sea or a
desert. The one resolution to escape rose stronger and stronger
within me, and I determined neither to eat nor sleep until I had
got away. The thought of leaving Nick was heavy indeed; and when
he ran to me in the dark hall and threw his arms around me, it
needed all my strength to keep from crying aloud.
“Davy,” he said passionately, “Davy, you mustn’t mind what she
says. She never means anything she says — she never cares for
anything save her pleasure. You and I will stay here until we are
old enough to run away to Kentucky. Davy! Answer me, Davy!”
I could not, try as I would. There were no words that would come
with honesty. But I pulled him down on the mahogany settle near
the door which led into the back gallery, and there we sat huddled
together in silence, while the storm raged furiously outside and
the draughts banged the great doors of the house. In the lightning
flashes I saw Nick’s face, and it haunted me afterwards through
many years of wandering. On it was written a sorrow for me greater
than my own sorrow. For God had given to this lad every human
passion and compassion.
The storm rolled away with the night, and Mammy came through the
hall with a candle.
“Whah is you, Marse Nick? Whah is you, honey? You’ suppah’s
ready.”
And so we went into our little dining room, but I would not eat.
The good old negress brushed her eyes with her apron as she
pressed a cake upon me she had made herself, for she had grown
fond of me. And presently we went away silently to bed.
It was a long, long time before Nick’s breathing told me that he
was asleep. He held me tightly clutched to him, and I know that he
feared I would leave him. The thought of going broke my heart, but
I never once wavered in my resolve, and I lay staring into the
darkness, pondering what to do. I thought of good Mr. Lowndes and
his wife, and I decided to go to Charlestown. Some of my boyish
motives come back to me now: I should be near Nick; and even at
that age, — having lived a life of self-reliance, — I thought of
gaining an education and of rising to a place of trust. Yes, I
would go to Mr. Lowndes, and ask him to let me work for him and so
earn my education.
With a heavy spirit I crept out of bed, slowly disengaging
Nick’s arm lest he should wake. He turned over and sighed in his
sleep. Carefully I dressed myself, and after I was dressed I could
not refrain from slipping to the bedside to bend over him once
again, — for he was the only one in my life with whom I had found
true companionship. Then I climbed carefully out of the window,
and so down the corner of the house to the ground.
It was starlight, and a waning moon hung in the sky. I made my
way through the drive between the black shadows of the forest, and
came at length to the big gates at the entrance, locked for the
night. A strange thought of their futility struck me as I climbed
the rail fence beside them, and pushed on into the main road, the
mud sucking under my shoes as I went. As I try now to cast my
memory back I can recall no fear, only a vast sense of loneliness,
and the very song of it seemed to be sung in never ending refrain
by the insects of the night. I had been alone in the mountains
before. I have crossed great strips of wilderness since, but
always there was love to go back to. Then I was leaving the only
being in the world that remained to me.
I must have walked two hours or more before I came to the mire
of a cross-road, and there I stood in a quandary of doubt as to
which side led to Charlestown.
As I lingered a light began to tremble in the heavens. A cock
crew in the distance. I sat down on a fallen log to rest. But
presently, as the light grew, I heard shouts which drew nearer and
deeper and brought me to my feet in an uncertainty of expectation.
Next came the rattling of chains, the scramble of hoofs in the
mire, and here was a wagon with a big canvas cover. Beside the
straining horses was a great, burly man with a red beard, cracking
his long whip, and calling to the horses in a strange tongue. He
stopped still beside his panting animals when he saw me, his high
boots sunk in the mud.
“Gut morning, poy,” he said, wiping his red face with his
sleeve; "what you do here?”
“I am going to Charlestown,” I answered.
“Ach!” he cried, “dot is pad. Mein poy, he run avay. You are ein
gut poy, I know. I vill pay ein gut price to help me vit mein
wagon — ja.”
“Where are you going?” I demanded, with a sudden wavering.
“Up country — pack country. You know der Proad River — yes?”
No, I did not. But a longing came upon me for the old backwoods
life, with its freedom and self-reliance, and a hatred for this
steaming country of heat and violent storms, and artificiality and
pomp. And I had a desire, even at that age, to make my own way in
the world.
“What will you give me?” I asked.
At that he put his finger to his nose.
“Thruppence py the day.”
I shook my head. He looked at me queerly.
“How old you pe, — twelve, yes?”
Now I had no notion of telling him. So I said: "Is this the
Charlestown road?”
“Fourpence!” he cried, “dot is riches.”
“I will go for sixpence,” I answered.
“Mein Gott!” he cried, “sixpence. Dot is robbery.” But seeing me
obdurate, he added: "I vill give it, because ein poy I must have.
Vat is your name, — Tavid? You are ein sharp poy, Tavid.”
And so I went with him.
In writing a biography, the relative value of days and years
should hold. There are days which count in space for years, and
years for days. I spent the time on the whole happily with this
Dutchman, whose name was Hans Koppel. He talked merrily save when
he spoke of the war against England, and then contemptuously, for
he was a bitter English partisan. And in contrast to this he would
dwell for hours on a king he called Friedrich der Grosse, and a
war he waged that was a war; and how this mighty king had fought a
mighty queen at Rossbach and Leuthen in his own country, — battles
that were battles.
“And you were there, Hans?” I asked him once.
“ja,” he said, “but I did not stay.”
“You ran away?”
“ja,” Hans would answer, laughing, “run avay. I love peace,
Tavid. Dot is vy I come here, and now,” bitterly, “and now ve haf
var again once.”
I would say nothing; but I must have looked my disapproval, for
he went on to explain that in Saxe-Gotha, where he was born, men
were made to fight whether they would or no; and they were stolen
from their wives at night by soldiers of the great king, or lured
away by fair promises.
Travelling with incredible slowness, in due time we came to a
county called Orangeburg, where all were Dutchmen like Hans, and
very few spoke English. And they all thought like Hans, and loved
peace, and hated the Congress. On Sundays, as we lay over at the
taverns, these would be filled with a rollicking crowd of fiddlers
and dancers, quaintly dressed, the women bringing their children
and babies. At such times Hans would be drunk, and I would have to
feed the tired horses and mount watch over the cargo. I had many
adventures, but none worth the telling here. And at length we came
to Hans’s farm, in a prettily rolling country on the Broad River.
Hans’s wife spoke no English at all, nor did the brood of children
running about the house. I had small fancy for staying in such a
place, and so Hans paid me two crowns for my three weeks’ service;
I think, with real regret, for labor was scarce in those parts,
and though I was young, I knew how to work. And I could at least
have guided his plough in the furrow and cared for his cattle.
It was the first money I had earned in my life, and a prouder
day than many I have had since.
For the convenience of travellers passing that way, Hans kept a
tavern, — if it could have been dignified by such a name. It was in
truth merely a log house with shakedowns, and stood across the
rude road from his log farmhouse. And he gave me leave to sleep
there and to work for my board until I cared to leave. It so
chanced that on the second day after my arrival a pack-train came
along, guided by a nettlesome old man and a strong, black-haired
lass of sixteen or thereabouts. The old man, whose name was
Ripley, wore a nut-brown hunting shirt trimmed with red cotton;
and he had no sooner slipped the packs from his horses than he
began to rail at Hans, who stood looking on.
“You damned Dutchmen be all Tories, and worse,” he cried; "you
stay here and till your farms while our boys are off in the hill
towns fighting Cherokees. I wish the devils had every one of your
fat sculps. Polly Ann, water the nags.”
Hans replied to this sally with great vigor, lapsing into Dutch.
Polly Ann led the scrawny ponies to the trough, but her eyes
snapped with merriment as she listened. She was a wonderfully
comely lass, despite her loose cotton gown and poke-bonnet and the
shoepacks on her feet. She had blue eyes, the whitest, strongest
of teeth, and the rosiest of faces.
“Gran’pa hates a Dutchman wuss’n pizen,” she said to me. "So do
I. We’ve all been burned out and sculped up river — and they never
give us so much as a man or a measure of corn.”
I helped her feed the animals, and tether them, and loose their
bells for the night, and carry the packs under cover.
“All the boys is gone to join Rutherford and lam the Indians,”
she continued, “so Gran’pa and I had to go to the settlements.
There wahn’t any one else. What’s your name?” she demanded
suddenly.
I told her.
She sat down on a log at the corner of the house, and pulled me
down beside her.
“And whar be you from?”
I told her. It was impossible to look into her face and not tell
her. She listened eagerly, now with compassion, and now showing
her white teeth in amusement. And when I had done, much to my
discomfiture, she seized me in her strong arms and kissed me.
“Poor Davy,” she cried, “you ain’t got a home. You shall come
home with us.”
Catching me by the hand, she ran like a deer across the road to
where her grandfather was still quarrelling violently with Hans,
and pulled him backward by the skirts of his hunting shirt. I
looked for another and mightier explosion from the old
backwoodsman, but to my astonishment he seemed to forget Hans’s
existence, and turned and smiled on her benevolently.
“Polly Ann,” said he, “what be you about now?”
“Gran’pa,” said she, “here’s Davy Trimble, who’s a good boy, and
his pa is just killed by the Cherokees along with Baskin, and he
wants work and a home, and he’s comin’ along with us.”
“All right, David,” answered Mr. Ripley, mildly, “ef Polly Ann
says so, you kin come. Whar was you raised?”
I told him on the upper Yadkin.
“You don’t tell me,” said he. "Did ye ever know Dan’l Boone?”
“I did, indeed, sir,” I answered, my face lighting up. "Can you
tell me where he is now?”
“He’s gone to Kaintuckee, them new settlements, fer good. And ef
I wasn’t eighty years old, I’d go thar, too.”
“I reckon I’ll go thar when I’m married,” said Polly Ann, and
blushed redder than ever. Drawing me to her, she said, “I’ll take
you, too, Davy.”
“When you marry that wuthless Tom McChesney,” said her
grandfather, testily.
“He’s not wuthless,” said Polly hotly, “he’s the best man in
Rutherford’s army. He’ll git more sculps then any of ’em, — you
see.”
“Tavy is ein gut poy,” Hans put in, for he had recovered his
composure. "I wish much he stay mit me.”
As for me, Polly Ann never consulted me on the subject — nor had
she need to. I would have followed her to kingdom come, and at the
thought of reaching the mountains my heart leaped with joy. We all
slept in the one flea-infested, windowless room of the "tavern"
that night; and before dawn I was up and untethered the horses,
and Polly Ann and I together lifted the two bushels of alum salt
on one of the beasts and the ploughshare on the other. By daylight
we had left Hans and his farm forever.
I can see the lass now, as she strode along the trace by the
flowing river, through sunlight and shadow, straight and supple
and strong. Sometimes she sang like a bird, and the forest rang.
Sometimes she would make fun of her grandfather or of me; and
again she would be silent for an hour at a time, staring ahead,
and then I knew she was thinking of that Tom McChesney. She would
wake from those reveries with a laugh, and give me a push to send
me rolling down a bank.
“What’s the matter, Davy? You look as solemn as a wood-owl. What
a little wiseacre you be!”
Once I retorted, “You were thinking of that Tom McChesney.”
“Ay, that she was, I’ll warrant,” snapped her grandfather.
Polly Ann replied, with a merry peal of laughter, “You are both
jealous of Tom — both of you. But, Davy, when you see him you’ll
love him as much as I do.”
“I’ll not,” I said sturdily.
“He’s a man to look upon — "
“He’s a rip-roarer,” old man Ripley put in. "Ye’re daft about
him.”
“That I am,” said Polly, flushing and subsiding; "but he’ll not
know it.”
As we rose into the more rugged country we passed more than one
charred cabin that told its silent story of Indian massacre. Only
on the scattered hill farms women and boys and old men were
working in the fields, all save the scalawags having gone to join
Rutherford. There were plenty of these around the taverns to make
eyes at Polly Ann and open love to her, had she allowed them; but
she treated them in return to such scathing tirades that they were
glad to desist — all but one. He must have been an escaped
redemptioner, for he wore jauntily a swanskin three-cornered hat
and stained breeches of a fine cloth. He was a bold, vain fellow.
“My beauty,” says he, as we sat at supper, “silver and Wedgwood
better become you than pewter and a trencher.”
“And I reckon a rope would sit better on your neck than a ruff,”
retorted Polly Ann, while the company shouted with laughter. But
he was not the kind to become discomfited.
“I’d give a guinea to see you in silk. But I vow your hair looks
better as it is.”
“Not so yours,” said she, like lightning; "’twould look better
to me hanging on the belt of one of them red devils.”
In the morning, when he would have lifted the pack of alum salt,
Polly Ann gave him a push that sent him sprawling. But she did it
in such good nature withal that the fellow mistook her. He
scrambled to his feet, flung his arm about her waist, and kissed
her. Whereupon I hit him with a sapling, and he staggered and let
her go.
“You imp of hell!” he cried, rubbing the bump. He made a vicious
dash at me that boded no good, but I slipped behind the hominy
block; and Polly Ann, who was like a panther on her feet, dashed
at him and gave him a buffet in the cheek that sent him reeling
again.
After that we were more devoted friends than ever.
We travelled slowly, day by day, until I saw the mountains lift
blue against the western sky, and the sight of them was like home
once more. I loved them; and though I thought with sadness of my
father, I was on the whole happier with Polly Ann than I had been
in the lonely cabin on the Yadkin. Her spirits flagged a little as
she drew near home, but old Mr. Ripley’s rose.
“There’s Burr’s,” he would say, “and O’Hara’s and Williamson’s,”
marking the cabins set amongst the stump-dotted corn-fields. "And
thar,” sweeping his hand at a blackened heap of logs lying on the
stones, “thar’s whar Nell Tyler and her baby was sculped.”
“Poor Nell,” said Polly Ann, the tears coming into her eyes as
she turned away.
“And Jim Tyler was killed gittin’ to the fort. He can’t say I
didn’t warn him.”
“I reckon he’ll never say nuthin’, now,” said Polly Ann.
It was in truth a dismal sight, — the shapeless timbers, the corn,
planted with such care, choked with weeds, and the poor utensils
of the little family scattered and broken before the door-sill.
These same Indians had killed my father; and there surged up in my
breast that hatred of the painted race felt by every backwoods boy
in my time.
Towards the end of the day the trace led into a beautiful green
valley, and in the middle of it was a stream shining in the
afternoon sun. Then Polly Ann fell entirely silent. And presently,
as the shadows grew purple, we came to a cabin set under some
spreading trees on a knoll where a woman sat spinning at the door,
three children playing at her feet. She stared at us so earnestly
that I looked at Polly Ann, and saw her redden and pale. The
children were the first to come shouting at us, and then the woman
dropped her wool and ran down the slope straight into Polly Ann’s
arms. Mr. Ripley halted the horses with a grunt.
The two women drew off and looked into each other’s faces. Then
Polly Ann dropped her eyes.
“Have ye — ?” she said, and stopped.
“No, Polly Ann, not one word sence Tom and his Pa went. What do
folks say in the settlements?”
Polly Ann turned up her nose.
“They don’t know nuthin’ in the settlements,” she replied.
“I wrote to Tom and told him you was gone,” said the older
woman. "I knowed he’d wanter hear.”
And she looked meaningly at Polly Ann, who said nothing. The
children had been pulling at the girl’s skirts, and suddenly she
made a dash at them. They scattered, screaming with delight, and
she after them.
“Howdy, Mr. Ripley?” said the woman, smiling a little.
“Howdy, Mis’ McChesney?” said the old man, shortly.
So this was the mother of Tom, of whom I had heard so much. She
was, in truth, a motherly-looking person, her fleshy face creased
with strong character.
“Who hev ye brought with ye?” she asked, glancing at me.
“A lad Polly Ann took a shine to in the settlements,” said the
old man. "Polly Ann! Polly Ann!” he cried sharply, “we’ll hev to
be gittin’ home.” And then, as though an afterthought (which it
really was not), he added, “How be ye for salt, Mis’ McChesney?”
“So-so,” said she.
“Wal, I reckon a little might come handy,” said he. And to the
girl who stood panting beside him, “Polly, give Mis’ McChesney
some salt.”
Polly Ann did, and generously, — the salt they had carried with so
much labor threescore and ten miles from the settlements. Then we
took our departure, the girl turning for one last look at Tom’s
mother, and at the cabin where he had dwelt. We were all silent
the rest of the way, climbing the slender trail through the forest
over the gap into the next valley. For I was jealous of Tom. I am
not ashamed to own it now.
In the smoky haze that rises just before night lets her curtain
fall, we descended the farther slope, and came to Mr. Ripley’s
cabin.
CHAPTER VII.
in sight of the blue wall once more
POLLY ANN lived alone with her grandfather, her father and
mother having been killed by Indians some years before. There was
that bond between us, had we needed one. Her father had built the
cabin, a large one with a loft and a ladder climbing to it, and a
sleeping room and a kitchen. The cabin stood on a terrace that
nature had levelled, looking across a swift and shallow stream
towards the mountains. There was the truck patch, with its yellow
squashes and melons, and cabbages and beans, where Polly Ann and I
worked through the hot mornings; and the corn patch, with the
great stumps of the primeval trees standing in it. All around us
the silent forest threw its encircling arms, spreading up the
slopes, higher and higher, to crown the crests with the little
pines and hemlocks and balsam fir.
There had been no meat save bacon since the McChesneys had left,
for of late game had become scarce, and old Mr. Ripley was too
feeble to go on the long hunts. So one day, when Polly Ann was
gone across the ridge, I took down the long rifle from the
buckhorns over the hearth, and the hunting knife and powder-horn
and pouch beside it, and trudged up the slope to a game trail I
discovered. All day I waited, until the forest light grew gray,
when a buck came and stood over the water, raising his head and
stamping from time to time. I took aim in the notch of a sapling,
brought him down, cleaned and skinned and dragged him into the
water, and triumphantly hauled one of his hams down the trail.
Polly Ann gave a cry of joy when she saw me.
“Davy,” she exclaimed, “little Davy, I reckoned you was gone
away from us. Gran’pa, here is Davy back, and he has shot a deer.”
“You don’t say?” replied Mr. Ripley, surveying me and my booty
with a grim smile.
“How could you, Gran’pa?” said Polly Ann, reproachfully.
“Wal,” said Mr. Ripley, “the gun was gone, an’ Davy. I reckon he
ain’t sich a little rascal after all.”
Polly Ann and I went up the next day, and brought the rest of
the buck merrily homeward. After that I became the hunter of the
family; but oftener than not I returned tired and empty-handed,
and ravenously hungry. Indeed, our chief game was rattlesnakes,
which we killed by the dozens in the corn and truck patches.
As Polly Ann and I went about our daily chores, we would talk of
Tom McChesney. Often she would sit idle at the hand-mill, a light
in her eyes that I would have given kingdoms for. One ever
memorable morning, early in the crisp autumn, a grizzled man
strode up the trail, and Polly Ann dropped the ear of corn she was
husking and stood still, her bosom heaving. It was Mr. McChesney,
Tom’s father — alone.
“No, Polly Ann,” he cried, “there ain’t nuthin’ happened. We’ve
laid out the hill towns. But the Virginna men wanted a guide, and
Tom volunteered, and so he ain’t come back with Rutherford’s
boys.”
Polly Ann seized him by the shoulders, and looked him in the
face.
“Be you tellin’ the truth, Warner McChesney?” she said in a hard
voice.
“As God hears me,” said Warner McChesney, solemnly. "He sent ye
this.”
He drew from the bosom of his hunting shirt a soiled piece of
birch bark, scrawled over with rude writing. Polly seized it, and
flew into the house.
The hickories turned a flaunting yellow, the oaks a copper-red,
the leaves crackled on the Catawba vines, and still Tom McChesney
did not come. The Cherokees were homeless and houseless and
subdued, — their hill towns burned, their corn destroyed, their
squaws and children wanderers. One by one the men of the Grape
Vine settlement returned to save what they might of their crops,
and plough for the next year — Burrs, O’Haras, Williamsons, and
Winns. Yes, Tom had gone to guide the Virginia boys. All had tales
to tell of his prowess, and how he had saved Rutherford’s men from
ambush at the risk of his life. To all of which Polly Ann listened
with conscious pride, and replied with sallies.
“I reckon I don’t care if he never comes back,” she would cry.
"If he likes the Virginny boys more than me, there be others here
I fancy more than him.”
Whereupon the informant, if he were not bound in matrimony,
would begin to make eyes at Polly Ann. Or, if he were bolder, and
went at the wooing in the more demonstrative fashion of the
backwoods — Polly Ann had a way of hitting him behind the ear with
most surprising effect.
One windy morning when the leaves were kiting over the valley we
were getting ready for pounding hominy, when a figure appeared on
the trail. Steadying the hood of her sunbonnet with her hand, the
girl gazed long and earnestly, and a lump came into my throat at
the thought that the comer might be Tom McChesney. Polly Ann sat
down at the block again in disgust.
“It’s only Chauncey Dike,” she said.
“Who’s Chauncey Dike?” I asked.
“He reckons he’s a buck,” was all that Polly Ann vouchsafed.
Chauncey drew near with a strut. He had very long black hair, a
new coonskin cap with a long tassel, and a new blue-fringed
hunting shirt. What first caught my eye was a couple of withered
Indian scalps that hung by their long locks from his girdle.
Chauncey Dike was certainly handsome.
“Wal, Polly Ann, are ye tired of hanging out fer Tom?” he cried,
when a dozen paces away.
“I wouldn’t be if you was the only one left ter choose,” Polly
Ann retorted.
Chauncey Dike stopped in his tracks and haw-hawed with laughter.
But I could see that he was not very much pleased.
“Wal,” said he, “I ’low ye won’t see Tom very soon. He’s gone to
Kaintuckee.”
“Has he?” said Polly Ann, with brave indifference.
“He met a gal on the trail — a blazin’ fine gal,” said Chauncey
Dike. "She was goin’ to Kaintuckee. And Tom — he ’lowed he’d go
’long.”
Polly Ann laughed, and fingered the withered pieces of skin at
Chauncey’s girdle.
“Did Tom give you them sculps?” she asked innocently.
Chauncey drew up stiffly.
“Who? Tom McChesney? I reckon he ain’t got none to give. This
here’s from a big brave at Noewee, whar the Virginny boys was
surprised.” And he held up the one with the longest tuft. "He’d
liked to tomahawked me out’n the briers, but I throwed him fust.”
“Shucks,” said Polly Ann, pounding the corn, “I reckon you found
him dead.”
But that night, as we sat before the fading red of the backlog,
the old man dozing in his chair, Polly Ann put her hand on mine.
“Davy,” she said softly, “do you reckon he’s gone to
Kaintuckee?”
How could I tell?
The days passed. The wind grew colder, and one subdued dawn we
awoke to find that the pines had fantastic white arms, and the
stream ran black between white banks. All that day, and for many
days after, the snow added silently to the thickness of its
blanket, and winter was upon us. It was a long winter and a rare
one. Polly Ann sat by the little window of the cabin, spinning the
flax into linsey-woolsey. And she made a hunting shirt for her
grandfather, and another little one for me which she fitted with
careful fingers. But as she spun, her wheel made the only
music — for Polly Ann sang no more. Once I came on her as she was
thrusting the tattered piece of birch bark into her gown, but she
never spoke to me more of Tom McChesney. When, from time to time,
the snow melted on the hillsides, I sometimes surprised a deer
there and shot him with the heavy rifle. And so the months wore on
till spring.
The buds reddened and popped, and the briers grew pink and
white. Through the lengthening days we toiled in the truck patch,
but always as I bent to my work Polly Ann’s face saddened me — it
had once been so bright, and it should have been so at this
season. Old Mr. Ripley grew querulous and savage and hard to
please. In the evening, when my work was done, I often lay on the
banks of the stream staring at the high ridge (its ragged edges
the setting sun burned a molten gold), and the thought grew on me
that I might make my way over the mountains into that land beyond,
and find Tom for Polly Ann. I even climbed the watershed to the
east as far as the O’Hara farm, to sound that big Irishman about
the trail. For he had once gone to Kentucky, to come back with his
scalp and little besides. O’Hara, with his brogue, gave me such a
terrifying notion of the horrors of the Wilderness Trail that I
threw up all thought of following it alone, and so I resolved to
wait until I heard of some settlers going over it. But none went
from the Grape Vine settlement that spring.
War was a-waging in Kentucky. The great Indian nations were
making a frantic effort to drive from their hunting grounds the
little bands of settlers there, and these were in sore straits.
So I waited, and gave Polly Ann no hint of my intention.
Sometimes she herself would slip away across the notch to see
Mrs. McChesney and the children. She never took me with her on
these journeys, but nearly always when she came back at nightfall
her eyes would be red, and I knew the two women had been weeping
together. There came a certain hot Sunday in July when she went on
this errand, and Grandpa Ripley having gone to spend the day at
old man Winn’s, I was left alone. I remember I sat on the squared
log of the door-step, wondering whether, if I were to make my way
to Salisbury, I could fall in with a party going across the
mountains into Kentucky. And wondering, likewise, what Polly Ann
would do without me. I was cleaning the long rifle, — a labor I
loved, — when suddenly I looked up, startled to see a man standing
in front of me. How he got there I know not. I stared at him. He
was a young man, very spare and very burned, with bright red hair
and blue eyes that had a kind of laughter in them, and yet were
sober. His buckskin hunting shirt was old and stained and frayed
by the briers, and his leggins and moccasins were wet from fording
the stream. He leaned his chin on the muzzle of his gun.
“Folks live here, sonny?” said he.
I nodded.
“Whar be they?”
“Out,” said I.
“Comin’ back?” he asked.
“To-night,” said I, and began to rub the lock.
“Be they good folks?” said he.
“Yes,” I answered.
“Wal,” said he, making a move to pass me, “I reckon I’ll slip in
and take what I’ve a mind to, and move on.”
Now I liked the man’s looks very much, but I did not know what
he would do. So I got in his way and clutched the gun. It was
loaded, but not primed, and I emptied a little powder from the
flask in the pan. At that he grinned.
“You’re a good boy, sonny,” he said. "Do you reckon you could
hit me if you shot?”
“Yes,” I said. But I knew I could scarcely hold the gun out
straight without a rest.
“And do you reckon I could hit you fust?” he asked. At that I
laughed, and he laughed.
“What’s your name?”
I told him.
“Who do you love best in all the world?” said he.
It was a queer question. But I told him Polly Ann Ripley.
“Oh!” said he, after a pause. "And what’s SHE like?”
“She’s beautiful,” I said; "she’s been very kind to me. She took
me home with her from the settlements when I had no place to go.
She’s good.”
“And a sharp tongue, I reckon,” said he.
“When people need it,” I answered.
“Oh!” said he. And presently, “She’s very merry, I’ll warrant.”
“She used to be, but that’s gone by,” I said.
“Gone by!” said he, his voice falling, “is she sick?”
“No,” said I, “she’s not sick, she’s sad.”
“Sad?” said he. It was then I noticed that he had a cut across
his temple, red and barely healed. "Do you reckon your Polly Ann
would give me a little mite to eat?”
This time I jumped up, ran into the house, and got down some
corn-pone and a leg of turkey. For that was the rule of the
border. He took them in great bites, but slowly, and he picked the
bones clean.
“I had breakfast yesterday morning,” said he, “about forty mile
from here.”
“And nothing since?” said I, in astonishment.
“Fresh air and water and exercise,” said he, and sat down on the
grass. He was silent for a long while, and so was I. For a notion
had struck me, though I hardly dared to give it voice.
“Are you going away?” I asked at last.
He laughed.
“Why?” said he.
“If you were going to Kaintuckee — " I began, and faltered. For he
stared at me very hard.
“Kaintuckee!” he said. "There’s a country! But it’s full of
blood and Injun varmints now. Would you leave Polly Ann and go to
Kaintuckee?”
“Are you going?” I said.
“I reckon I am,” he said, “as soon as I kin.”
“Will you take me?” I asked, breathless. "I — I won’t be in your
way, and I can walk — and — shoot game.”
At that he bent back his head and laughed, which made me redden
with anger. Then he turned and looked at me more soberly.
“You’re a queer little piece,” said he. "Why do you want to go
thar?”
“I want to find Tom McChesney for Polly Ann,” I said.
He turned away his face.
“A good-for-nothing scamp,” said he.
“I have long thought so,” I said.
He laughed again. It was a laugh that made me want to join him,
had I not been irritated.
“And he’s a scamp, you say. And why?”
“Else he would be coming back to Polly Ann.”
“Mayhap he couldn’t,” said the stranger.
“Chauncey Dike said he went off with another girl into
Kaintuckee.”
“And what did Polly Ann say to that?” the stranger demanded.
“She asked Chauncey if Tom McChesney gave him the scalps he had
on his belt.”
At that he laughed in good earnest, and slapped his
breech-clouts repeatedly. All at once he stopped, and stared up
the ridge.
“Is that Polly Ann?” said he.
I looked, and far up the trail was a speck.
“I reckon it is,” I answered, and wondered at his eyesight. "She
travels over to see Tom McChesney’s Ma once in a while.”
He looked at me queerly.
“I reckon I’ll go here and sit down, Davy,” said he, “so’s not
to be in the way.” And he walked around the corner of the house.
Polly Ann sauntered down the trail slowly, as was her wont after
such an occasion. And the man behind the house twice whispered
with extreme caution, “How near is she?” before she came up the
path.
“Have you been lonesome, Davy?” she said.
“No,” said I, “I’ve had a visitor.”
“It’s not Chauncey Dike again?” she said. "He doesn’t dare show
his face here.”
“No, it wasn’t Chauncey. This man would like to have seen you,
Polly Ann. He — " here I braced myself, — "he knew Tom McChesney. He
called him a good-for-nothing scamp.”
“He did — did he!” said Polly Ann, very low. "I reckon it was good
for him I wasn’t here.”
I grinned.
“What are you laughing at, you little monkey,” said Polly Ann,
crossly. "’Pon my soul, sometimes I reckon you are a witch.”
“Polly Ann,” I said, “did I ever do anything but good to you?”
She made a dive at me, and before I could escape caught me in
her strong young arms and hugged me.
“You’re the best friend I have, little Davy,” she cried.
“I reckon that’s so,” said the stranger, who had risen and was
standing at the corner.
Polly Ann looked at him like a frightened doe. And as she
stared, uncertain whether to stay or fly, the color surged into
her cheeks and mounted to her fair forehead.
“Tom!” she faltered.
“I’ve come back, Polly Ann,” said he. But his voice was not so
clear as a while ago.
Then Polly Ann surprised me.
“What made you come back?” said she, as though she didn’t care a
minkskin. Whereat Mr. McChesney shifted his feet.
“I reckon it was to fetch you, Polly Ann.”
“I like that!” cried she. "He’s come to fetch me, Davy.” That
was the first time in months her laugh had sounded natural. "I
heerd you fetched one gal acrost the mountains, and now you want
to fetch another.”
“Polly Ann,” says he, “there was a time when you knew a truthful
man from a liar.”
“That time’s past,” retorted she; "I reckon all men are liars.
What are ye tom-foolin’ about here for, Tom McChesney, when yere
Ma’s breakin’ her heart? I wonder ye come back at all.”
“Polly Ann,” says he, very serious, “I ain’t a boaster. But when
I think what I come through to git here, I wonder that I come back
at all. The folks shut up at Harrod’s said it was sure death ter
cross the mountains now. I’ve walked two hundred miles, and fed
seven times, and my sculp’s as near hangin’ on a Red Stick’s belt
as I ever want it to be.”
“Tom McChesney,” said Polly Ann, with her hands on her hips and
her sunbonnet tilted, “that’s the longest speech you ever made in
your life.”
I declare I lost my temper with Polly Ann then, nor did I blame
Tom McChesney for turning on his heel and walking away. But he had
gone no distance at all before Polly Ann, with three springs, was
at his shoulder.
“Tom!” she said very gently.
He hesitated, stopped, thumped the stock of his gun on the
ground, and wheeled. He looked at her doubtingly, and her eyes
fell to the ground.
“Tom McChesney,” said she, “you’re a born fool with wimmen.”
“Thank God for that,” said he, his eyes devouring her.
“Ay,” said she. And then, “You want me to go to Kaintuckee with
you?”
“That’s what I come for,” he stammered, his assurance all run
away again.
“I’ll go,” she answered, so gently that her words were all but
blown away by the summer wind. He laid his rifle against a stump
at the edge of the corn-field, but she bounded clear of him. Then
she stood, panting, her eyes sparkling.
“I’ll go,” she said, raising her finger, “I’ll go for one
thing.”
“What’s that?” he demanded.
“That you’ll take Davy along with us.”
This time Tom had her, struggling like a wild thing in his arms,
and kissing her black hair madly. As for me, I might have been in
the next settlement for all they cared. And then Polly Ann, as red
as a holly berry, broke away from him and ran to me, caught me up,
and hid her face in my shoulder. Tom McChesney stood looking at
us, grinning, and that day I ceased to hate him.
“There’s no devil ef I don’t take him, Polly Ann,” said he.
"Why, he was a-goin’ to Kaintuckee ter find me for you.”
“What?” said she, raising her head.
“That’s what he told me afore he knew who I was. He wanted to
know ef I’d fetch him thar.”
“Little Davy!” cried Polly Ann.
The last I saw of them that day they were going off up the trace
towards his mother’s, Polly Ann keeping ahead of him and just out
of his reach. And I was very, very happy. For Tom McChesney had
come back at last, and Polly Ann was herself once more.
As long as I live I shall never forget Polly Ann’s wedding.
She was all for delay, and such a bunch of coquetry as I have
never seen. She raised one objection after another; but Tom was a
firm man, and his late experiences in the wilderness had made him
impatient of trifling. He had promised the Kentucky settlers,
fighting for their lives in their blockhouses, that he would come
back again. And a resolute man who was a good shot was sorely
missed in the country in those days.
It was not the thousand dangers and hardships of the journey
across the Wilderness Trail that frightened Polly Ann. Not she.
Nor would she listen to Tom when he implored her to let him return
alone, to come back for her when the redskins had got over the
first furies of their hatred. As for me, the thought of going with
them into that promised land was like wine. Wondering what the
place was like, I could not sleep of nights.
“Ain’t you afeerd to go, Davy?” said Tom to me.
“You promised Polly Ann to take me,” said I, indignantly.
“Davy,” said he, “you ain’t over handsome. ’Twouldn’t improve
yere looks to be bald. They hev a way of takin’ yere ha’r. Better
stay behind with Gran’pa Ripley till I kin fetch ye both.”
“Tom,” said Polly Ann, “you kin just go back alone if you don’t
take Davy.”
So one of the Winn boys agreed to come over to stay with old Mr.
Ripley until quieter times.
The preparations for the wedding went on apace that week. I had
not thought that the Grape Vine settlement held so many people.
And they came from other settlements, too, for news spread quickly
in that country, despite the distances. Tom McChesney was plainly
a favorite with the men who had marched with Rutherford. All the
week they came, loaded with offerings, turkeys and venison and
pork and bear meat — greatest delicacy of all — until the cool spring
was filled for the feast. From thirty miles down the Broad, a
gaunt Baptist preacher on a fat white pony arrived the night
before. He had been sent for to tie the knot.
Polly Ann’s wedding-day dawned bright and fair, and long before
the sun glistened on the corn tassels we were up and clearing out
the big room. The fiddlers came first — a merry lot. And then the
guests from afar began to arrive. Some of them had travelled half
the night. The bridegroom’s friends were assembling at the
McChesney place. At last, when the sun was over the stream, rose
such Indian war-whoops and shots from the ridge trail as made me
think the redskins were upon us. The shouts and hurrahs grew
louder and louder, the quickening thud of horses’ hoofs was heard
in the woods, and there burst into sight of the assembly by the
truck patch two wild figures on crazed horses charging down the
path towards the house. We scattered to right and left. On they
came, leaping logs and brush and ditches, until one of them pulled
up, yelling madly, at the very door, the foam-flecked sides of his
horse moving with quick heaves.
It was Chauncey Dike, and he had won the race for the bottle of
"Black Betty,” — Chauncey Dike, his long, black hair shining with
bear’s oil. Amid the cheers of the bride’s friends he leaped from
his saddle, mounted a stump and, flapping his arms, crowed in
victory. Before he had done the vanguard of the groom’s friends
were upon us, pell-mell, all in the finest of backwoods
regalia, — new hunting shirts, trimmed with bits of color, and all
armed to the teeth — scalping knife, tomahawk, and all. Nor had
Chauncey Dike forgotten the scalp of the brave who leaped at him
out of the briers at Neowee.
Polly Ann was radiant in a white linen gown, woven and sewed by
her own hands. It was not such a gown as Mrs. Temple, Nick’s
mother, would have worn, and yet she was to me an hundred times
more beautiful than that lady in all her silks. Peeping out from
under it were the little blue-beaded moccasins which Tom himself
had brought across the mountains in the bosom of his hunting
shirt. Polly Ann was radiant, and yet at times so rapturously shy
that when the preacher announced himself ready to tie the knot she
ran into the house and hid in the cupboard — for Polly Ann was a
child of nature. Thence, coloring like a wild rose, she was
dragged by a boisterous bevy of girls in linsey-woolsey to the
spreading maple of the forest that stood on the high bank over the
stream. The assembly fell solemn, and not a sound was heard save
the breathing of Nature in the heyday of her time. And though I
was happy, the sobs rose in my throat. There stood Polly Ann, as
white now as the bleached linen she wore, and Tom McChesney, tall
and spare and broad, as strong a figure of a man as ever I laid
eyes on. God had truly made that couple for wedlock in His leafy
temple.
The deep-toned words of the preacher in prayer broke the
stillness. They were made man and wife. And then began a day of
merriment, of unrestraint, such as the backwoods alone knows. The
feast was spread out in the long grass under the trees — sides of
venison, bear meat, corn-pone fresh baked by Mrs. McChesney and
Polly Ann herself, and all the vegetables in the patch. There was
no stint, either, of maple beer and rum and "Black Betty,” and
toasts to the bride and groom amidst gusts of laughter "that they
might populate Kaintuckee.” And Polly Ann would have it that I
should sit by her side under the maple.
The fiddlers played, and there were foot races and shooting
matches. Ay, and wrestling matches in the severe manner of the
backwoods between the young bucks, more than one of which might
have ended seriously were it not for the high humor of the crowd.
Tom McChesney himself was in most of them, a hot favorite. By a
trick he had learned in the Indian country he threw Chauncey Dike
(no mean adversary) so hard that the backwoods dandy lay for a
moment in sleep. Contrary to the custom of many, Tom was not in
the habit of crowing on such occasions, nor did he even smile as
he helped Chauncey to his feet. But Polly Ann knew, and I knew,
that he was thinking of what Chauncey had said to her.
So the long summer afternoon wore away into twilight, and the
sun fell behind the blue ridges we were to cross. Pine knots were
lighted in the big room, the fiddlers set to again, and then came
jigs and three and four handed reels that made the puncheons
rattle, — chicken-flutter and cut-the-buckle, — and Polly Ann was the
leader now, the young men flinging the girls from fireplace to
window in the reels, and back again; and when, panting and
perspiring, the lass was too tired to stand longer, she dropped
into the hospitable lap of the nearest buck who was perched on the
bench along the wall awaiting his chance. For so it went in the
backwoods in those days, and long after, and no harm in it that
ever I could see.
Well, suddenly, as if by concert, the music stopped, and a shout
of laughter rang under the beams as Polly Ann flew out of the door
with the girls after her, as swift of foot as she. They dragged
her, a struggling captive, to the bride-chamber which made the
other end of the house, and when they emerged, blushing and
giggling and subdued, the fun began with Tom McChesney. He gave
the young men a pretty fight indeed, and long before they had him
conquered the elder guests had made their escape through door and
window.
All night the reels and jigs went on, and the feasting and
drinking too. In the fine rain that came at dawn to hide the
crests, the company rode wearily homeward through the notches.
Some to endure, and many to quail,
Some to conquer, and many to fail,
Toiling over the Wilderness Trail.
As long as I live I shall never forget the morning we started on
our journey across the Blue Wall. Before the sun chased away the
filmy veil of mist from the brooks in the valley, the McChesneys,
father, mother, and children, were gathered to see us depart. And
as they helped us to tighten the packsaddles Tom himself had made
from chosen tree-forks, they did not cease lamenting that we were
going to certain death. Our scrawny horses splashed across the
stream, and we turned to see a gaunt and lonely figure standing
apart against the sun, stern and sorrowful. We waved our hands,
and set our faces towards Kaintuckee.
Tom walked ahead, rifle on shoulder, then Polly Ann; and lastly
I drove the two shaggy ponies, the instruments of husbandry we had
been able to gather awry on their packs, — a scythe, a spade, and a
hoe. I triumphantly carried the axe.
It was not long before we were in the wilderness, shut in by
mountain crags, and presently Polly Ann forgot her sorrows in the
perils of the trace. Choked by briers and grapevines, blocked by
sliding stones and earth, it rose and rose through the heat and
burden of the day until it lost itself in the open heights. As the
sun was wearing down to the western ridges the mischievous sorrel
mare turned her pack on a sapling, and one of the precious bags
burst. In an instant we were on our knees gathering the golden
meal in our hands. Polly Ann baked journeycakes on a hot stone
from what we saved under the shiny ivy leaves, and scarce had I
spancelled the horses ere Tom returned with a fat turkey he had
shot.
“Was there ever sech a wedding journey!” said Polly Ann, as we
sat about the fire, for the mountain air was chill. "And Tom and
Davy as grave as parsons. Ye’d guess one of you was Rutherford
himself, and the other Mr. Boone.”
No wonder he was grave. I little realized then the task he had
set himself, to pilot a woman and a lad into a country haunted by
frenzied savages, when single men feared to go this season. But
now he smiled, and patted Polly Ann’s brown hand.
“It’s one of yer own choosing, lass,” said he.
“Of my own choosing!” cried she. "Come, Davy, we’ll go back to
Grandpa.”
Tom grinned.
“I reckon the redskins won’t bother us till we git by the
Nollichucky and Watauga settlements,” he said.
“The redskins!” said Polly Ann, indignant; "I reckon if one of
’em did git me he’d kiss me once in a while.”
Whereupon Tom, looking more sheepish still, tried to kiss her,
and failed ignominiously, for she vanished into the dark woods.
“If a redskin got you here,” said Tom, when she had slipped
back, “he’d fetch you to Nick-a-jack Cave.”
“What’s that?” she demanded.
“Where all the red and white and yellow scalawags over the
mountains is gathered,” he answered. And he told of a deep gorge
between towering mountains where a great river cried angrily, of a
black cave out of which a black stream ran, where a man could
paddle a dugout for miles into the rock. The river was the
Tennessee, and the place the resort of the Chickamauga bandits,
pirates of the mountains, outcasts of all nations. And Dragging
Canoe was their chief.
It was on the whole a merry journey, the first part of it, if a
rough one. Often Polly Ann would draw me to her and whisper:
"We’ll hold out, Davy. He’ll never now.” When the truth was that
the big fellow was going at half his pace on our account. He told
us there was no fear of redskins here, yet, when the scream of a
painter or the hoot of an owl stirred me from my exhausted
slumber, I caught sight of him with his back to a tree, staring
into the forest, his rifle at his side. The day was dawning.
“Turn about’s fair,” I expostulated.
“Ye’ll need yere sleep, Davy,” said he, “or ye’ll never grow any
bigger.”
“I thought Kaintuckee was to the west,” I said, “and you’re
making north.” For I had observed him day after day. We had left
the trails. Sometimes he climbed tree, and again he sent me to the
upper branches, whence I surveyed a sea of tree-tops waving in the
wind, and looked onward to where a green velvet hollow lay
nestling on the western side of a saddle-backed ridge.
“North!” said Tom to Polly Ann, laughing. "The little devil will
beat me at woodcraft soon. Ay, north, Davy. I’m hunting for the
Nollichucky Trace that leads to the Watauga settlement.”
It was wonderful to me how he chose his way through the
mountains. Once in a while we caught sight of a yellow blaze in a
tree, made by himself scarce a month gone, when he came southward
alone to fetch Polly Ann. Again, the tired roan shied back from
the bleached bones of a traveller, picked clean by wolves. At
sundown, when we loosed our exhausted horses to graze on the wet
grass by the streams, Tom would go off to look for a deer or
turkey, and often not come back to us until long after darkness
had fallen.
“Davy’ll take care of you, Polly Ann,” he would say as he left
us.
And she would smile at him bravely and say, “I reckon I kin look
out for Davy awhile yet.”
But when he was gone, and the crooning stillness set in broken
only by the many sounds of the night, we would sit huddled
together by the fire. It was dread for him she felt, not for
herself. And in both our minds rose red images of hideous foes
skulking behind his brave form as he trod the forest floor. Polly
Ann was not the woman to whimper.
And yet I have but dim recollections of this journey. It was no
hardship to a lad brought up in woodcraft. Fear of the Indians,
like a dog shivering with the cold, was a deadened pain on the
border.
Strangely enough it was I who chanced upon the Nollichucky
Trace, which follows the meanderings of that river northward
through the great Smoky Mountains. It was made long ago by the
Southern Indians as they threaded their way to the Hunting Lands
of Kaintuckee, and shared now by Indian traders. The path was
redolent with odors, and bright with mountain shrubs and
flowers, — the pink laurel bush, the shining rhododendron, and the
grape and plum and wild crab. The clear notes of the mountain
birds were in our ears by day, and the music of the water falling
over the ledges, mingled with that of the leaves rustling in the
wind, lulled us to sleep at night. High above us, as we descended,
the gap, from naked crag to timber-covered ridge, was spanned by
the eagle’s flight. And virgin valleys, where future generations
were to be born, spread out and narrowed again, — valleys with a
deep carpet of cane and grass, where the deer and elk and bear fed
unmolested.
It was perchance the next evening that my eyes fell upon a sight
which is one of the wonders of my boyish memories. The trail
slipped to the edge of a precipice, and at our feet the valley
widened. Planted amidst giant trees, on a shining green lawn that
ran down to the racing Nollichucky was the strangest house it has
ever been my lot to see — of no shape, of huge size, and built of
logs, one wing hitched to another by "dog alleys" (as we called
them); and from its wide stone chimneys the pearly smoke rose
upward in the still air through the poplar branches. Beyond it a
setting sun gilded the corn-fields, and horses and cattle dotted
the pastures. We stood for a while staring at this oasis in the
wilderness, and to my boyish fancy it was a fitting introduction
to a delectable land.
“Glory be to heaven!” exclaimed Polly Ann.
“It’s Nollichucky Jack’s house,” said Tom.
“And who may he be?” said she.
“Who may he be!” cried Tom; "Captain John Sevier, king of the
border, and I reckon the best man to sweep out redskins in the
Watauga settlements.”
“Do you know him?” said she.
“I was chose as one of his scouts when we fired the Cherokee
hill towns last summer,” said Tom, with pride. "Thar was blood and
thunder for ye! We went down the Great War-path which lies below
us, and when we was through there wasn’t a corn-shuck or a wigwam
or a war post left. We didn’t harm the squaws nor the children,
but there warn’t no prisoners took. When Nollichucky Jack strikes
I reckon it’s more like a thunderbolt nor anything else.”
“Do you think he’s at home, Tom?” I asked, fearful that I should
not see this celebrated person.
“We’ll soon l’arn,” said he, as we descended. "I heerd he was
agoin’ to punish them Chickamauga robbers by Nick-a-jack.”
Just then we heard a prodigious barking, and a dozen hounds came
charging down the path at our horses’ legs, the roan shying into
the truck patch. A man’s voice, deep, clear, compelling, was heard
calling: —
“Vi! Flora! Ripper!”
I saw him coming from the porch of the house, a tall slim figure
in a hunting shirt — that fitted to perfection — and cavalry boots.
His face, his carriage, his quick movement and stride filled my
notion of a hero, and my instinct told me he was a gentleman born.
“Why, bless my soul, it’s Tom McChesney!” he cried, ten paces
away, while Tom grinned with pleasure at the recognition "But what
have you here?”
“A wife,” said Tom, standing on one foot.
Captain Sevier fixed his dark blue eyes on Polly Ann with
approbation, and he bowed to her very gracefully.
“Where are you going, Ma’am, may I ask?” he said.
“To Kaintuckee,” said Polly Ann.
“To Kaintuckee!” cried Captain Sevier, turning to Tom. "Egad,
then, you’ve no right to a wife, — and to such a wife,” and he
glanced again at Polly Ann. "Why, McChesney, you never struck me
as a rash man. Have you lost your senses, to take a woman into
Kentucky this year?”
“So the forts be still in trouble?” said Tom.
“Trouble?” cried Mr. Sevier, with a quick fling of his whip at
an unruly hound, “Harrodstown, Boonesboro, Logan’s Fort at St.
Asaph’s, — they don’t dare stick their noses outside the stockades.
The Indians have swarmed into Kentucky like red ants, I tell you.
Ten days ago, when I was in the Holston settlements, Major Ben
Logan came in. His fort had been shut up since May, they were out
of powder and lead, and somebody had to come. How did he come? As
the wolf lopes, nay, as the crow flies over crag and ford,
Cumberland, Clinch, and all, forty miles a day for five days, and
never saw a trace — for the war parties were watching the Wilderness
Road.” And he swung again towards Polly Ann. "You’ll not go to
Kaintuckee, ma’am; you’ll stay here with us until the redskins are
beaten off there. He may go if he likes.”
“I reckon we didn’t come this far to give out, Captain Sevier,”
said she.
“You don’t look to be the kind to give out, Mrs. McChesney,”
said he. "And yet it may not be a matter of giving out,” he added
more soberly. This mixture of heartiness and gravity seemed to sit
well on him. "Surely you have been enterprising, Tom. Where in the
name of the Continental Congress did you get the lad?”
“I married him along with Polly Ann,” said Tom.
“That was the bargain, and I reckon he was worth it.”
“I’d take a dozen to get her,” declared Mr. Sevier, while Polly
Ann blushed. "Well, well, supper’s waiting us, and cider and
applejack, for we don’t get a wedding party every day. Some
gentlemen are here whose word may have more weight and whose
attractions may be greater than mine.”
He whistled to a negro lad, who took our horses, and led us
through the court-yard and the house to the lawn at the far side
of it. A rude table was set there under a great tree, and around
it three gentlemen were talking. My memory of all of them is more
vivid than it might be were their names not household words in the
Western country. Captain Sevier startled them.
“My friends,” said he, “if you have despatches for Kaintuckee, I
pray you get them ready over night.”
They looked up at him, one sternly, the other two gravely.
“What the devil do you mean, Sevier?” said the stern one.
“That my friend, Tom McChesney, is going there with his wife,
unless we can stop him,” said Sevier.
“Stop him!” thundered the stern gentleman, kicking back his
chair and straightening up to what seemed to me a colossal height.
I stared at him, boylike. He had long, iron-gray hair and a
creased, fleshy face and sunken eyes. He looked as if he might
stop anybody as he turned upon Tom. "Who the devil is this Tom
McChesney?” he demanded.
Sevier laughed.
“The best scout I ever laid eyes on,” said he. "A deadly man
with a Deckard, an unerring man at choosing a wife" (and he bowed
to the reddening Polly Ann), “and a fool to run the risk of losing
her.”
“Tut, tut,” said the iron gentleman, who was the famous Captain
Evan Shelby of King’s Meadows, “he’ll leave her here in our
settlements while he helps us fight Dragging Canoe and his
Chickamauga pirates.”
“If he leaves me,” said Polly Ann, her eyes flashing, “that’s an
end to the bargain. He’ll never find me more.”
Captain Sevier laughed again.
“There’s spirit for you,” he cried, slapping his whip against
his boot.
At this another gentleman stood up, a younger counterpart of the
first, only he towered higher and his shoulders were broader. He
had a big-featured face, and pleasant eyes — that twinkled
now — sunken in, with fleshy creases at the corners.
“Tom McChesney,” said he, “don’t mind my father. If any man
besides Logan can get inside the forts, you can. Do you remember
me?”
“I reckon I do, Mr. Isaac Shelby,” said Tom, putting a big hand
into Mr. Shelby’s bigger one. "I reckon I won’t soon forget how
you stepped out of ranks and tuk command when the boys was
runnin’, and turned the tide.”
He looked like the man to step out of ranks and take command.
“Pish!” said Mr. Isaac Shelby, blushing like a girl; "where
would I have been if you and Moore and Findley and the rest hadn’t
stood ’em off till we turned round?”
By this time the third gentleman had drawn my attention. Not by
anything he said, for he remained silent, sitting with his dark
brown head bent forward, quietly gazing at the scene from under
his brows. The instant he spoke they turned towards him. He was
perhaps forty, and broad-shouldered, not so tall as Mr. Sevier.
“Why do you go to Kaintuckee, McChesney?” he asked.
“I give my word to Mr. Harrod and Mr. Clark to come back, Mr.
Robertson,” said Tom.
“And the wife? If you take her, you run a great risk of losing
her.”
“And if he leaves me,” said Polly Ann, flinging her head, “he
will lose me sure.”
The others laughed, but Mr. Robertson merely smiled.
“Faith,” cried Captain Sevier, “if those I met coming back
helter-skelter over the Wilderness Trace had been of that stripe,
they’d have more men in the forts now.”
With that the Captain called for supper to be served where we
sat. He was a widower, with lads somewhere near my own age, and I
recall being shown about the place by them. And later, when the
fireflies glowed and the Nollichucky sang in the darkness, we
listened to the talk of the war of the year gone by. I needed not
to be told that before me were the renowned leaders of the Watauga
settlements. My hero worship cried it aloud within me. These
captains dwelt on the border-land of mystery, conquered the
wilderness, and drove before them its savage tribes by their
might. When they spoke of the Cherokees and told how that same
Stuart — the companion of Cameron — was urging them to war against our
people, a fierce anger blazed within me. For the Cherokees had
killed my father.
I remember the men, — scarcely what they said: Evan Shelby’s
words, like heavy blows on an anvil; Isaac Shelby’s, none the less
forceful; James Robertson compelling his listeners by some strange
power. He was perchance the strongest man there, though none of us
guessed, after ruling that region, that he was to repeat untold
hardships to found and rear another settlement farther west. But
best I loved to hear Captain Sevier, whose talk lacked not force,
but had a daring, a humor, a lightness of touch, that seemed more
in keeping with that world I had left behind me in Charlestown.
Him I loved, and at length I solved the puzzle. To me he was Nick
Temple grown to manhood.
I slept in the room with Captain Sevier’s boys, and one window
of it was of paper smeared with bear’s grease, through which the
sunlight came all bleared and yellow in the morning. I had a boy’s
interest in affairs, and I remember being told that the gentlemen
were met here to discuss the treaty between themselves and the
great Oconostota, chief of the Cherokees, and also to consider the
policy of punishing once for all Dragging Canoe and his bandits at
Chickamauga.
As we sat at breakfast under the trees, these gentlemen
generously dropped their own business to counsel Tom, and I
observed with pride that he had gained their regard during the
last year’s war. Shelby’s threats and Robertson’s warnings and
Sevier’s exhortations having no effect upon his determination to
proceed to Kentucky, they began to advise him how to go, and he
sat silent while they talked. And finally, when they asked him, he
spoke of making through Carter’s Valley for Cumberland Gap and the
Wilderness Trail.
“Egad,” cried Captain Sevier, “I have so many times found the
boldest plan the safest that I have become a coward that way. What
do you say to it, Mr. Robertson?”
Mr. Robertson leaned his square shoulders over the table.
“He may fall in with a party going over,” he answered, without
looking up.
Polly Ann looked at Tom as if to say that the whole Continental
Army could not give her as much protection.
We left that hospitable place about nine o’clock, Mr. Robertson
having written a letter to Colonel Daniel Boone, — shut up in the
fort at Boonesboro, — should we be so fortunate as to reach
Kaintuckee: and another to a young gentleman by the name of George
Rogers Clark, apparently a leader there. Captain Sevier bowed over
Polly Ann’s hand as if she were a great lady, and wished her a
happy honeymoon, and me he patted on the head and called a brave
lad. And soon we had passed beyond the corn-field into the
Wilderness again.
Our way was down the Nollichucky, past the great bend of it
below Lick Creek, and so to the Great War-path, the trail by which
countless parties of red marauders had travelled north and south.
It led, indeed, northeast between the mountain ranges. Although we
kept a watch by day and night, we saw no sign of Dragging Canoe or
his men, and at length we forded the Holston and came to the
scattered settlement in Carter’s Valley.
I have since racked my brain to remember at whose cabin we
stopped there. He was a rough backwoodsman with a wife and a horde
of children. But I recall that a great rain came out of the
mountains and down the valley. We were counting over the powder
gourds in our packs, when there burst in at the door as wild a man
as has ever been my lot to see. His brown beard was grown like a
bramble patch, his eye had a violet light, and his hunting shirt
was in tatters. He was thin to gauntness, ate ravenously of the
food that was set before him, and throwing off his soaked
moccasins, he spread his scalded feet to the blaze, and the
steaming odor of drying leather filled the room.
“Whar be ye from?” asked Tom.
For answer the man bared his arm, then his shoulder, and two
angry scars, long and red, revealed themselves, and around his
wrists were deep gouges where he had been bound.
“They killed Sue,” he cried, “sculped her afore my very eyes.
And they chopped my boy outen the hickory withes and carried him
to the Creek Nation. At a place where there was a standin’ stone I
broke loose from three of ’em and come here over the mountains,
and I ain’t had nothin’, stranger, but berries and chainey
brier-root for ten days. God damn ’em!” he cried, standing up and
tottering with the pain in his feet, “if I can get a Deckard — "
“Will you go back?” said Tom.
“Go back!” he shouted, “I’ll go back and fight ’em while I have
blood in my body.”
He fell into a bunk, but his sorrow haunted him even in his
troubled sleep, and his moans awed us as we listened. The next day
he told us his story with more calmness. It was horrible indeed,
and might well have frightened a less courageous woman than Polly
Ann. Imploring her not to go, he became wild again, and brought
tears to her eyes when he spoke of his own wife. "They tomahawked
her, ma’am, because she could not walk, and the baby beside her,
and I standing by with my arms tied.”
As long as I live I shall never forget that scene, and how Tom
pleaded with Polly Ann to stay behind, but she would not listen to
him.
“You’re going, Tom?” she said.
“Yes,” he answered, turning away, “I gave ’em my word.”
“And your word to me?” said Polly Ann.
He did not answer.
We fixed on a Saturday to start, to give the horses time to
rest, and in the hope that we might hear of some relief party
going over the Gap. On Thursday Tom made a trip to the store in
the valley, and came back with a Deckard rifle he had bought for
the stranger, whose name was Weldon. There was no news from
Kaintuckee, but the Carter’s Valley settlers seemed to think that
matters were better there. It was that same night, I believe, that
two men arrived from Fort Chiswell. One, whose name was Cutcheon,
was a little man with a short forehead and a bad eye, and he wore
a weather-beaten blue coat of military cut. The second was a big,
light-colored, fleshy man, and a loud talker. He wore a hunting
shirt and leggings. They were both the worse for rum they had had
on the road, the big man talking very loud and boastfully.
“Afeard to go to Kaintuckee!” said he. "I’ve met a parcel o’
cowards on the road, turned back. There ain’t nothin’ to be afeard
of, eh, stranger?” he added, to Tom, who paid no manner of
attention to him. The small man scarce opened his mouth, but sat
with his head bowed forward on his breast when he was not
drinking. We passed a dismal, crowded night in the room with such
companions. When they heard that we were to go over the mountains,
nothing would satisfy the big man but to go with us.
“Come, stranger,” said he to Tom, “two good rifles such as we is
ain’t to be throwed away.”
“Why do you want to go over?” asked Tom. "Be ye a Tory?” he
demanded suspiciously.
“Why do you go over?” retorted Riley, for that was his name. "I
reckon I’m no more of a Tory than you.”
“Whar did ye come from?” said Tom.
“Chiswell’s mines, taking out lead for the army o’ Congress. But
there ain’t excitement enough in it.”
“And you?” said Tom, turning to Cutcheon and eying his military
coat.
“I got tired of their damned discipline,” the man answered
surlily. He was a deserter.
“Look you,” said Tom, sternly, “if you come, what I say is law.”
Such was the sacrifice we were put to by our need of company.
But in those days a man was a man, and scarce enough on the
Wilderness Trail in that year of ’77. So we started away from
Carter’s Valley on a bright Saturday morning, the grass glistening
after a week’s rain, the road sodden, and the smell of the summer
earth heavy. Tom and Weldon walked ahead, driving the two horses,
followed by Cutcheon, his head dropped between his shoulders. The
big man, Riley, regaled Polly Ann.
“My pluck is,” said he, “my pluck is to give a redskin no
chance. Shoot ’em down like hogs. It takes a good un to stalk me,
Ma’am. Up on the Kanawha I’ve had hand-to-hand fights with ’em,
and made ’em cry quits.”
“Law!” exclaimed Polly Ann, nudging me, “it was a lucky thing we
run into you in the valley.”
But presently we left the road and took a mountain trail, — as
stiff a climb as we had yet had. Polly Ann went up it like a bird,
talking all the while to Riley, who blew like a bellows. For once
he was silent.
We spent two, perchance three, days climbing and descending and
fording. At night Tom would suffer none to watch save Weldon and
himself, not trusting Riley or Cutcheon. And the rascals were well
content to sleep. At length we came, to a cabin on a creek, the
corn between the stumps around it choked with weeds, and no sign
of smoke in the chimney. Behind it slanted up, in giant steps, a
forest-clad hill of a thousand feet, and in front of it the stream
was dammed and lined with cane.
“Who keeps house?” cried Tom, at the threshold.
He pushed back the door, fashioned in one great slab from a
forest tree. His welcome was an angry whir, and a huge yellow
rattler lay coiled within, his head reared to strike. Polly Ann
leaned back.
“Mercy,” she cried, “that’s a bad sign.”
But Tom killed the snake, and we made ready to use the cabin
that night and the next day. For the horses were to be rested and
meat was to be got, as we could not use our guns so freely on the
far side of Cumberland Gap. In the morning, before he and Weldon
left, Tom took me around the end of the cabin.
“Davy,” said he, “I don’t trust these rascals. Kin you shoot a
pistol?”
I reckoned I could.
He had taken one out of the pack he had got from Captain Sevier
and pushed it between the logs where the clay had fallen out. "If
they try anything,” said he, “shoot ’em. And don’t be afeard of
killing ’em.” He patted me on the back, and went off up the slope
with Weldon. Polly Ann and I stood watching them until they were
out of sight.
About eleven o’clock Riley and Cutcheon moved off to the edge of
a cane-brake near the water, and sat there for a while, talking in
low tones. The horses were belled and spancelled near by, feeding
on the cane and wild grass, and Polly Ann was cooking
journey-cakes on a stone.
“What makes you so sober, Davy?” she said.
I didn’t answer.
“Davy,” she cried, “be happy while you’re young. ’Tis a fine
day, and Kaintuckee’s over yonder.” She picked up her skirts and
sang: —
“First upon the heeltap,
Then upon the toe.”
The men by the cane-brake turned and came towards us.
“Ye’re happy to-day, Mis’ McChesney,” said Riley.
“Why shouldn’t I be?” said Polly Ann; "we’re all a-goin’ to
Kaintuckee.”
“We’re a-goin’ back to Cyarter’s Valley,” said Riley, in his
blustering way. "This here ain’t as excitin’ as I thought. I
reckon there ain’t no redskins nohow.”
“What!” cried Polly Ann, in loud scorn, “ye’re a-goin’ to
desert? There’ll be redskins enough by and by, I’ll warrant ye.”
“How’d you like to come along of us,” says Riley; "that ain’t
any place for wimmen, over yonder.”
“Along of you!” cried Polly Ann, with flashing eyes. "Do you
hear that, Davy?”
I did. Meanwhile the man Cutcheon was slowly walking towards
her. It took scarce a second for me to make up my mind. I slipped
around the corner of the house, seized the pistol, primed it with
a trembling hand, and came back to behold Polly Ann, with flaming
cheeks, facing them. They did not so much as glance at me. Riley
held a little back of the two, being the coward. But Cutcheon
stood ready, like a wolf.
I did not wait for him to spring, but, taking the best aim I
could with my two hands, fired. With a curse that echoed in the
crags, he threw up his arms and fell forward, writhing, on the
turf.
“Run for the cabin, Polly Ann,” I shouted, “and bar the door.”
There was no need. For an instant Riley wavered, and then fled
to the cane.
Polly Ann and I went to the man on the ground, and turned him
over. His eyes slid upwards. There was a bloody froth on his lips.
“Davy!” cried she, awestricken, “Davy, ye’ve killed him!”
I grew dizzy and sick at the thought, but she caught me and held
me to her. Presently we sat down on the door log, gazing at the
corpse. Then I began to reflect, and took out my powder gourd and
loaded the pistol.
“What are ye a-doing?” she said.
“In case the other one comes back,” said I.
“Pooh,” said Polly Ann, “he’ll not come back.” Which was true. I
have never laid eyes on Riley to this day.
“I reckon we’d better fetch it out of the sun,” said she, after
a while. And so we dragged it under an oak, covered the face, and
left it.
He was the first man I ever killed, and the business by no means
came natural to me. And that day the journey-cakes which Polly Ann
had made were untasted by us both. The afternoon dragged
interminably. Try as we would, we could not get out of our minds
the Thing that lay under the oak.
It was near sundown when Tom and Weldon appeared on the mountain
side carrying a buck between them. Tom glanced from one to the
other of us keenly. He was very quick to divine.
“Whar be they?” said he.
“Show him, Davy,” said Polly Ann.
I took him over to the oak, and Polly Ann told him the story. He
gave me one look, I remember, and there was more of gratitude in
it than in a thousand words. Then he seized a piece of cold cake
from the stone.
“Which trace did he take?” he demanded of me.
But Polly Ann hung on his shoulder.
“Tom, Tom!” she cried, “you beant goin’ to leave us again. Tom,
he’ll die in the wilderness, and we must git to Kaintuckee.”
The next vivid thing in my memory is the view of the last
barrier Nature had reared between us and the delectable country.
It stood like a lion at the gateway, and for some minutes we gazed
at it in terror from Powell’s Valley below. How many thousands
have looked at it with sinking hearts! How many weaklings has its
frown turned back! There seemed to be engraved upon it the dark
history of the dark and bloody land beyond. Nothing in this life
worth having is won for the asking; and the best is fought for,
and bled for, and died for. Written, too, upon that towering wall
of white rock, in the handwriting of God Himself, is the history
of the indomitable Race to which we belong.
For fifty miles we travelled under it, towards the Gap, our eyes
drawn to it by a resistless fascination. The sun went over it
early in the day, as though glad to leave the place, and after
that a dark scowl would settle there. At night we felt its
presence, like a curse. Even Polly Ann was silent. And she had
need to be now. When it was necessary, we talked in low tones, and
the bell-clappers on the horses were not loosed at night. It was
here, but four years gone, that Daniel Boone’s family was
attacked, and his son killed by the Indians.
We passed, from time to time, deserted cabins and camps, and
some places that might once have been called settlements: Elk
Garden, where the pioneers of the last four years had been wont to
lay in a simple supply of seed corn and Irish potatoes; and the
spot where Henderson and his company had camped on the way to
establish Boonesboro two years before. And at last we struck the
trace that mounted upward to the Gateway itself.
CHAPTER IX.
on the wilderness trail
AND now we had our hands upon the latch, and God alone knew what
was behind the gate. Toil, with a certainty, but our lives had
known it. Death, perchance. But Death had been near to all of us,
and his presence did not frighten. As we climbed towards the Gap,
I recalled with strange aptness a quaint saying of my father’s
that Kaintuckee was the Garden of Eden, and that men were being
justly punished with blood for their presumption.
As if to crown that judgment, the day was dark and lowering,
with showers of rain from time to time. And when we spoke, — Polly
Ann and I, — it was in whispers. The trace was very narrow, with
Daniel Boone’s blazes, two years old, upon the trees; but the way
was not over steep. Cumberland Mountain was as silent and deserted
as when the first man had known it.
Alas, for the vanity of human presage! We gained the top, and
entered unmolested. No Eden suddenly dazzled our eye, no splendor
burst upon it. Nothing told us, as we halted in our weariness,
that we had reached the Promised Land. The mists weighed heavily
on the evergreens of the slopes and hid the ridges, and we passed
that night in cold discomfort. It was the first of many without a
fire.
The next day brought us to the Cumberland, tawny and swollen
from the rains, and here we had to stop to fell trees to make a
raft on which to ferry over our packs. We bound the logs together
with grapevines, and as we worked my imagination painted for me
many a red face peering from the bushes on the farther shore. And
when we got into the river and were caught and spun by the
hurrying stream, I hearkened for a shot from the farther bank.
While Polly Ann and I were scrambling to get the raft landed, Tom
and Weldon swam over with the horses. And so we lay the second
night dolefully in the rain. But not so much as a whimper escaped
from Polly Ann. I have often told her since that the sorest trial
she had was the guard she kept on her tongue, — a hardship indeed
for one of Irish inheritance. Many a pull had she lightened for us
by a flash of humor.
The next morning the sun relented, and the wine of his dawn was
wine indeed to our flagging hopes. Going down to wash at the
river’s brink, I heard a movement in the cane, and stood frozen
and staring until a great, bearded head, black as tar, was thrust
out between the stalks and looked at me with blinking red eyes.
The next step revealed the hump of the beast, and the next his
tasselled tail lashing his dirty brown quarters. I did not tarry
longer, but ran to tell Tom. He made bold to risk a shot and light
a fire, and thus we had buffalo meat for some days after.
We were still in the mountains. The trail led down the river for
a bit through the worst of canebrakes, and every now and again we
stopped while Tom and Weldon scouted. Once the roan mare made a
dash through the brake, and, though Polly Ann burst through one
way to head her off and I another, we reached the bank of Richland
Creek in time to see her nose and the top of her pack above the
brown water. There was nothing for it but to swim after her, which
I did, and caught her quietly feeding in the cane on the other
side. By great good fortune the other horse bore the powder.
“Drat you, Nancy,” said Polly Ann to the mare, as she handed me
my clothes, “I’d sooner carry the pack myself than be bothered
with you.”
“Hush,” said I, “the redskins will get us.”
Polly Ann regarded me scornfully as I stood bedraggled before
her.
“Redskins!” she cried. "Nonsense! I reckon it’s all talk about
redskins.”
But we had scarce caught up ere we saw Tom standing rigid with
his hand raised. Before him, on a mound bared of cane, were the
charred remains of a fire. The sight of them transformed Weldon.
His eyes glared again, even as when we had first seen him, curses
escaped under his breath, and he would have darted into the cane
had not Tom seized him sternly by the shoulder. As for me, my
heart hammered against my ribs, and I grew sick with listening. It
was at that instant that my admiration for Tom McChesney burst
bounds, and that I got some real inkling of what woodcraft might
be. Stepping silently between the tree trunks, his eyes bent on
the leafy loam, he found a footprint here and another there, and
suddenly he went into the cane with a sign to us to remain. It
seemed an age before he returned. Then he began to rake the ashes,
and, suddenly bending down, seized something in them, — the broken
bowl of an Indian pipe.
“Shawnees!” he said; "I reckoned so.” It was at length the
beseeching in Polly Ann’s eyes that he answered.
“A war party — tracks three days old. They took poplar.”
To take poplar was our backwoods expression for embarking in a
canoe, the dugouts being fashioned from the great poplar trees.
I did not reflect then, as I have since and often, how great was
the knowledge and resource Tom practised that day. Our feeling for
him (Polly Ann’s and mine) fell little short of worship. In
company ill at ease, in the forest he became silent and
masterful — an unerring woodsman, capable of meeting the Indian on
his own footing. And, strangest thought of all, he and many I
could name who went into Kentucky, had escaped, by a kind of
strange fate, being born in the north of Ireland. This was so of
Andrew Jackson himself.
The rest of the day he led us in silence down the trace, his eye
alert to penetrate every corner of the forest, his hand near the
trigger of his long Deckard. I followed in boylike imitation,
searching every thicket for alien form and color, and yearning for
stature and responsibility. As for poor Weldon, he would stride
for hours at a time with eyes fixed ahead, a wild figure, — ragged
and fringed. And we knew that the soul within him was torn with
thoughts of his dead wife and of his child in captivity. Again,
when the trance left him, he was an addition to our little party
not to be despised.
At dark Polly Ann and I carried the packs across a creek on a
fallen tree, she taking one end and I the other. We camped there,
where the loam was trampled and torn by countless herds of bison,
and had only parched corn and the remains of a buffalo steak for
supper, as the meal was mouldy from its wetting, and running low.
When Weldon had gone a little distance up the creek to scout, Tom
relented from the sternness which his vigilance imposed and came
and sat down on a log beside Polly Ann and me.
“’Tis a hard journey, little girl,” he said, patting her; "I
reckon I done wrong to fetch you.”
I can see him now, as the twilight settled down over the
wilderness, his honest face red and freckled, but aglow with the
tenderness it had hidden during the day, one big hand enfolding
hers, and the other on my shoulder.
“Hark, Davy!” said Polly Ann, “he’s fair tired of us already.
Davy, take me back.”
“Hush, Polly Ann,” he answered; delighted at her raillery. "But
I’ve a word to say to you. If we come on to the redskins, you and
Davy make for the cane as hard as you kin kilter. Keep out of
sight.”
“As hard as we kin kilter!” exclaimed Polly Ann, indignantly. "I
reckon not, Tom McChesney. Davy taught me to shoot long ago, afore
you made up your mind to come back from Kaintuckee.”
Tom chuckled. "So Davy taught you to shoot,” he said, and
checked himself. "He ain’t such a bad one with a pistol,” — and he
patted me, — "but I allow ye’d better hunt kiver just the same. And
if they ketch ye, Polly Ann, just you go along and pretend to be
happy, and tear off a snatch of your dress now and then, if you
get a chance. It wouldn’t take me but a little time to run into
Harrodstown or Boone’s Station from here, and fetch a party to
follow ye.”
Two days went by, — two days of strain in sunlight, and of
watching and fitful sleep in darkness. But the Wilderness Trail
was deserted. Here and there a lean-to — silent remnant of the year
gone by — spoke of the little bands of emigrants which had once made
their way so cheerfully to the new country. Again it was a child’s
doll, the rags of it beaten by the weather to a rusty hue. Every
hour that we progressed seemed to justify the sagacity and
boldness of Tom’s plan, nor did it appear to have entered a
painted skull that a white man would have the hardihood to try the
trail this year. There were neither signs nor sounds save Nature’s
own, the hoot of the wood-owl, the distant bark of a mountain
wolf, the whir of a partridge as she left her brood. At length we
could stand no more the repression that silence and watching put
upon us, and when a rotten bank gave way and flung Polly Ann and
the sorrel mare into a creek, even Weldon smiled as we pulled her,
bedraggled and laughing, from the muddy water. This was after we
had ferried the Rockcastle River.
Our trace rose and fell over height and valley, until we knew
that we were come to a wonderland at last. We stood one evening on
a spur as the setting sun flooded the natural park below us with a
crystal light and, striking a tall sycamore, turned its green to
gold. We were now on the hills whence the water ran down to
nourish the fat land, and I could scarce believe that the garden
spot on which our eyes feasted could be the scene of the blood and
suffering of which we had heard. Here at last was the fairyland of
my childhood, the country beyond the Blue Wall.
We went down the river that led into it, with awes as though we
were trespassers against God Himself, — as though He had made it too
beautiful and too fruitful for the toilers of this earth. And you
who read this an hundred years hence may not believe the marvels
of it to the pioneer, and in particular to one born and bred in
the scanty, hard soil of the mountains. Nature had made it for her
park, — ay, and scented it with her own perfumes. Giant trees, which
had watched generations come and go, some of which mayhap had been
saplings when the Norman came to England, grew in groves, — the
gnarled and twisted oak, and that godsend to the settlers, the
sugar-maple; the coffee tree with its drooping buds; the mulberry,
the cherry, and the plum; the sassafras and the pawpaw; the poplar
and the sycamore, slender maidens of the forest, garbed in
daintier colors, — ay, and that resplendent brunette with the white
flowers, the magnolia; and all underneath, in the green shade,
enamelled banks which the birds themselves sought to rival.
At length, one afternoon, we came to the grove of wild apple
trees so lovingly spoken of by emigrants as the Crab Orchard, and
where formerly they had delighted to linger. The plain near by was
flecked with the brown backs of feeding buffalo, but we dared not
stop, and pressed on to find a camp in the forest. As we walked in
the filtered sunlight we had a great fright, Polly Ann and I.
Shrill, discordant cries suddenly burst from the branches above
us, and a flock of strange, green birds flecked with red flew over
our heads. Even Tom, intent upon the trail, turned and laughed at
Polly Ann as she stood clutching me.
“Shucks,” said he, “they’re only paroquets.”
We made our camp in a little dell where there was short green
grass by the brookside and steep banks overgrown with brambles on
either hand. Tom knew the place, and declared that we were within
thirty miles of the station. A giant oak had blown down across the
water, and, cutting out a few branches of this, we spread our
blankets under it on the turf. Tethering our faithful beasts, and
cutting a quantity of pea-vine for their night’s food, we lay down
to sleep, Tom taking the first watch.
I had the second, for Tom trusted me now, and glorying in that
trust I was alert and vigilant. A shy moon peeped at me between
the trees, and was fantastically reflected in the water. The creek
rippled over the limestone, and an elk screamed in the forest far
beyond. When at length I had called Weldon to take the third
watch, I lay down with a sense of peace, soothed by the sweet
odors of the night.
I awoke suddenly. I had been dreaming of Nick Temple and Temple
Bow, and my father coming back to me there with a great gash in
his shoulder like Weldon’s. I lay for a moment dazed by the
transition, staring through the gray light. Then I sat up, the
soft stamping and snorting of the horses in my ears. The sorrel
mare had her nose high, her tail twitching, but there was no other
sound in the leafy wilderness. With a bound of returning sense I
looked for Weldon. He had fallen asleep on the bank above, his
body dropped across the trunk of the oak. I leaped on the trunk
and made my way along it, stepping over him, until I reached and
hid myself in the great roots of the tree on the bank above. The
cold shiver of the dawn was in my body as I waited and listened.
Should I wake Tom? The vast forest was silent, and yet in its
shadowy depths my imagination drew moving forms. I hesitated.
The light grew: the boles of the trees came out, one by one,
through the purple. The tangled mass down the creek took on a
shade of green, and a faint breath came from the southward. The
sorrel mare sniffed it, and stamped. Then silence again, — a long
silence. Could it be that the cane moved in the thicket? Or had my
eyes deceived me? I stared so hard that it seemed to rustle all
over. Perhaps some deer were feeding there, for it was no unusual
thing, when we rose in the morning, to hear the whistle of a
startled doe near our camping ground. I was thoroughly frightened
now, — and yet I had the speculative Scotch mind. The thicket was
some one hundred and fifty yards above, and on the flooded lands
at a bend. If there were Indians in it, they could not see the
sleeping forms of our party under me because of a bend in the
stream. They might have seen me, though I had kept very still in
the twisted roots of the oak, and now I was cramped. If Indians
were there, they could determine our position well enough by the
occasional stamping and snorting of the horses. And this made my
fear more probable, for I had heard that horses and cattle often
warned pioneers of the presence of redskins.
Another thing: if they were a small party, they would probably
seek to surprise us by coming out of the cane into the creek bed
above the bend, and stalk down the creek. If a large band, they
would surround and overpower us. I drew the conclusion that it
must be a small party — if a party at all. And I would have given a
shot in the arm to be able to see over the banks of the creek.
Finally I decided to awake Tom.
It was no easy matter to get down to where he was without being
seen by eyes in the cane. I clung to the under branches of the
oak, finally reached the shelving bank, and slid down slowly. I
touched him on the shoulder. He awoke with a start, and by
instinct seized the rifle lying beside him.
“What is it, Davy?” he whispered.
I told what had happened and my surmise. He glanced then at the
restless horses and nodded, pointing up at the sleeping figure of
Weldon, in full sight on the log. The Indians must have seen him.
Tom picked up the spare rifle.
“Davy,” said he, “you stay here beside Polly Ann, behind the
oak. You kin shoot with a rest; but don’t shoot,” said he,
earnestly, “for God’s sake don’t shoot unless you’re sure to
kill.”
I nodded. For a moment he looked at the face of Polly Ann,
sleeping peacefully, and the fierce light faded from his eyes. He
brushed her on the cheek and she awoke and smiled at him,
trustfully, lovingly. He put his finger to his lips.
“Stay with Davy,” he said. Turning to me, he added: "When you
wake Weldon, wake him easy. So.” He put his hand in mine, and
gradually tightened it. "Wake him that way, and he won’t jump.”
Polly Ann asked no questions. She looked at Tom, and her soul
was in her face. She seized the pistol from the blanket. Then we
watched him creeping down the creek on his belly, close to the
bank. Next we moved behind the fallen tree, and I put my hand in
Weldon’s. He woke with a sigh, started, but we drew him down
behind the log. Presently he climbed cautiously up the bank and
took station in the muddy roots of the tree. Then we waited,
watching Tom with a prayer in our hearts. Those who have not felt
it know not the fearfulness of waiting for an Indian attack.
At last Tom reached the bend in the bank, beside some red-bud
bushes, and there he stayed. A level shaft of light shot through
the forest. The birds, twittering, awoke. A great hawk soared high
in the blue over our heads. An hour passed. I had sighted the
rifle among the yellow leaves of the fallen oak an hundred times.
But Polly Ann looked not once to the right or left. Her eyes and
her prayers followed the form of her husband.
Then, like the cracking of a great drover’s whip, a shot rang
out in the stillness, and my hands tightened over the rifle-stock.
A piece of bark struck me in the face, and a dead leaf fluttered
to the ground. Almost instantly there was another shot, and a blue
wisp of smoke rose from the red-bud bushes, where Tom was. The
horses whinnied, there was a rustle in the cane, and silence.
Weldon bent over.
“My God!” he whispered hoarsely, “he hit one. Tom hit one.”
I felt Polly Ann’s hand on my face.
“Davy dear,” she said, “are ye hurt?”
“No,” said I, dazed, and wondering why Weldon had not been shot
long ago as he slumbered. I was burning to climb the bank and ask
him whether he had seen the Indian fall.
Again there was silence, — a silence even more awful than before.
The sun crept higher, the magic of his rays turning the creek from
black to crystal, and the birds began to sing again. And still
there was no sign of the treacherous enemy that lurked about us.
Could Tom get back? I glanced at Polly Ann. The same question was
written in her yearning eyes, staring at the spot where the gray
of his hunting shirt showed through the bushes at the bend.
Suddenly her hand tightened on mine. The hunting shirt was gone!
After that, in the intervals when my terror left me, I tried to
speculate upon the plan of the savages. Their own numbers could
not be great, and yet they must have known from our trace how few
we were. Scanning the ground, I noted that the forest was fairly
clean of undergrowth on both sides of us. Below, the stream ran
straight, but there were growths of cane and briers. Looking up, I
saw Weldon faced about. It was the obvious move.
But where had Tom gone?
Next my eye was caught by a little run fringed with bushes that
curved around the cane near the bend. I traced its course,
unconsciously, bit by bit, until it reached the edge of a bank not
fifty feet away.
All at once my breath left me. Through the tangle of bramble
stems at the mouth of the run, above naked brown shoulders there
glared at me, hideously streaked with red, a face. Had my fancy
lied? I stared again until my eyes were blurred, now tortured by
doubt, now so completely convinced that my fingers almost released
the trigger, — for I had thrown the sights into line over the tree.
I know not to this day whether I shot from determination or
nervousness. My shoulder bruised by the kick, the smoke like a
veil before my face, it was some moments ere I knew that the air
was full of whistling bullets; and then the gun was torn from my
hands, and I saw Polly Ann ramming in a new charge.
“The pistol, Davy,” she cried.
One torture was over, another on. Crack after crack sounded from
the forest — from here and there and everywhere, it seemed — and with
a song that like a hurtling insect ran the scale of notes, the
bullets buried themselves in the trunk of our oak with a chug.
Once in a while I heard Weldon’s answering shot, but I remembered
my promise to Tom not to waste powder unless I were sure. The
agony was the breathing space we had while they crept nearer. Then
we thought of Tom, and I dared not glance at Polly Ann for fear
that the sight of her face would unnerve me.
Then a longing to kill seized me, a longing so strange and
fierce that I could scarce be still. I know now that it comes in
battle to all men, and with intensity to the hunted, and it
explained to me more clearly what followed. I fairly prayed for
the sight of a painted form, and time after time my fancy tricked
me into the notion that I had one. And even as I searched the
brambles at the top of the run a puff of smoke rose out of them, a
bullet burying itself in the roots near Weldon, who fired in
return. I say that I have some notion of what possessed the man,
for he was crazed with passion at fighting the race which had so
cruelly wronged him. Horror-struck, I saw him swing down from the
bank, splash through the water with raised tomahawk, and gain the
top of the run. In less time than it takes me to write these words
he had dragged a hideous, naked warrior out of the brambles, and
with an avalanche of crumbling earth they slid into the waters of
the creek. Polly Ann and I stared transfixed at the fearful fight
that followed, nor can I give any adequate description of it.
Weldon had struck through the brambles, but the savage had taken
the blow on his gun-barrel and broken the handle of the tomahawk,
and it was man to man as they rolled in the shallow water, locked
in a death embrace. Neither might reach for his knife, neither was
able to hold the other down, Weldon’s curses surcharged with
hatred. the Indian straining silently save for a gasp or a
guttural note, the white a bearded madman, the savage a devil with
a glistening, paint-streaked body, his features now agonized as
his muscles strained and cracked, now lighted with a diabolical
joy. But the pent-up rage of months gave the white man strength.
Polly Ann and I were powerless for fear of shooting Weldon, and
gazed absorbed at the fiendish scene with eyes not to be
withdrawn. The tree-trunk shook. A long, bronze arm reached out
from above, and a painted face glowered at us from the very roots
where Weldon had lain. That moment I took to be my last, and in it
I seemed to taste all eternity, I heard but faintly a noise
beyond. It was the shock of the heavy Indian falling on Polly Ann
and me as we cowered under the trunk, and even then there was an
instant that we stood gazing at him as at a worm writhing in the
clay. It was she who fired the pistol and made the great hole in
his head, and so he twitched and died. After that a confusion of
shots, war-whoops, a vision of two naked forms flying from tree to
tree towards the cane, and then — God be praised — Tom’s voice
shouting: —
“Polly Ann! Polly Ann!”
Before she had reached the top of the bank Tom had her in his
arms, and a dozen tall gray figures leaped the six feet into the
stream and stopped. My own eyes turned with theirs to see the body
of poor Weldon lying face downward in the water. But beyond it a
tragedy awaited me. Defiant, immovable, save for the heaving of
his naked chest, the savage who had killed him stood erect with
folded arms facing us. The smoke cleared away from a gleaming
rifle-barrel, and the brave staggered and fell and died as silent
as he stood, his feathers making ripples in the stream. It was
cold-blooded, if you like, but war in those days was to the death,
and knew no mercy. The tall backwoodsman who had shot him waded
across the stream, and in the twinkling of an eye seized the
scalp-lock and ran it round with his knife, holding up the
bleeding trophy with a shout. Staggering to my feet, I stretched
myself, but I had been cramped so long that I tottered and would
have fallen had not Tom’s hand steadied me.
“Davy!” he cried. "Thank God, little Davy! the varmints didn’t
get ye.”
“And you, Tom?” I answered, looking up at him, bewildered with
happiness.
“They was nearer than I suspicioned when I went off,” he said,
and looked at me curiously. "Drat the little deevil,” he said
affectionately, and his voice trembled, “he took care of Polly
Ann, I’ll warrant.”
He carried me to the top of the bank, where we were surrounded
by the whole band of backwoodsmen.
“That he did!” cried Polly Ann, “and fetched a redskin yonder as
clean as you could have done it, Tom.”
“The little deevil!” exclaimed Tom again.
I looked up, burning with this praise from Tom (for I had never
thought of praise nor of anything save his happiness and Polly
Ann’s). I looked up, and my eyes were caught and held with a
strange fascination by fearless blue ones that gazed down into
them. I give you but a poor description of the owner of these blue
eyes, for personal magnetism springs not from one feature or
another. He was a young man, — perhaps five and twenty as I now know
age, — woodsman-clad, square-built, sun-reddened. His hair might
have been orange in one light and sand-colored in another. With a
boy’s sense of such things I knew that the other woodsmen were
waiting for him to speak, for they glanced at him expectantly.
“You had a near call, McChesney,” said he, at length; "fortunate
for you we were after this band, — shot some of it to pieces
yesterday morning.” He paused, looking at Tom with that quality of
tribute which comes naturally to a leader of men. "By God,” he
said, “I didn’t think you’d try it.”
“My word is good, Colonel Clark,” answered Tom, simply.
Young Colonel Clark glanced at the lithe figure of Polly Ann. He
seemed a man of few words, for he did not add to his praise of
Tom’s achievement by complimenting her as Captain Sevier had done.
In fact, he said nothing more, but leaped down the bank and strode
into the water where the body of Weldon lay, and dragged it out
himself. We gathered around it silently, and two great tears
rolled down Polly Ann’s cheeks as she parted the hair with
tenderness and loosened the clenched hands. Nor did any of the
tall woodsmen speak. Poor Weldon! The tragedy of his life and
death was the tragedy of Kentucky herself. They buried him by the
waterside, where he had fallen.
But there was little time for mourning on the border. The burial
finished, the Kentuckians splashed across the creek, and one of
them, stooping with a shout at the mouth of the run, lifted out of
the brambles a painted body with drooping head and feathers
trailing.
“Ay, Mac,” he cried, “here’s a sculp for ye.”
“It’s Davy’s,” exclaimed Polly Ann from the top of the bank;
"Davy shot that one.”
“Hooray for Davy,” cried a huge, strapping backwoodsman who
stood beside her, and the others laughingly took up the shout.
"Hooray for Davy. Bring him over, Cowan.” The giant threw me on
his shoulder as though I had been a fox, leaped down, and took the
stream in two strides. I little thought how often he was to carry
me in days to come, but I felt a great awe at the strength of him,
as I stared into his rough features and his veined and weathered
skin. He stood me down beside the Indian’s body, smiled as he
whipped my hunting knife from my belt, and said, “Now, Davy, take
the sculp.”
Nothing loath, I seized the Indian by the long scalp-lock, while
my big friend guided my hand, and amid laughter and cheers I cut
off my first trophy of war. Nor did I have any other feeling than
fierce hatred of the race which had killed my father.
Those who have known armies in their discipline will find it
difficult to understand the leadership of the border. Such
leadership was granted only to those whose force and individuality
compelled men to obey them. I had my first glimpse of it that day.
This Colonel Clark to whom Tom delivered Mr. Robertson’s letter
was perchance the youngest man in the company that had rescued us,
saving only a slim lad of seventeen whom I noticed and envied, and
whose name was James Ray. Colonel Clark, so I was told by my
friend Cowan, held that title in Kentucky by reason of his
prowess.
Clark had been standing quietly on the bank while I had scalped
my first redskin. Then he called Tom McChesney to him and
questioned him closely about our journey, the signs we had seen,
and, finally, the news in the Watauga settlements. While this was
going on the others gathered round them.
“What now?” asked Cowan, when he had finished.
“Back to Harrodstown,” answered the Colonel, shortly.
There was a brief silence, followed by a hoarse murmur from a
thick-set man at the edge of the crowd, who shouldered his way to
the centre of it.
“We set out to hunt a fight, and my pluck is to clean up. We
ain’t finished ’em yet.”
The man had a deep, coarse voice that was a piece with his
roughness.
“I reckon this band ain’t a-goin’ to harry the station any more,
McGary,” cried Cowan.
“By Job, what did we come out for? Who’ll take the trail with
me?”
There were some who answered him, and straightway they began to
quarrel among themselves, filling the woods with a babel of
voices. While I stood listening to these disputes with a boy’s awe
of a man’s quarrel, what was my astonishment to feel a hand on my
shoulder. It was Colonel Clark’s, and he was not paying the least
attention to the dispute.
“Davy,” said he, “you look as if you could make a fire.”
“Yes, sir,” I answered, gasping.
“Well,” said he, “make one.”
I lighted a piece of punk with the flint, and, wrapping it up in
some dry brush, soon had a blaze started. Looking up, I caught his
eye on me again.
“Mrs. McChesney,” said Colonel Clark to Polly Ann, “you look as
if you could make johnny-cake. Have you any meal?”
“That I have,” cried Polly Ann, “though it’s fair mouldy. Davy,
run and fetch it.”
I ran to the pack on the sorrel mare. When I returned Mr. Clark
said: —
“That seems a handy boy, Mrs. McChesney.”
“Handy!” cried Polly Ann, “I reckon he’s more than handy. Didn’t
he save my life twice on our way out here?”
“And how was that?” said the Colonel.
“Run and fetch some water, Davy,” said Polly Ann, and
straightway launched forth into a vivid description of my
exploits, as she mixed the meal. Nay, she went so far as to tell
how she came by me. The young Colonel listened gravely, though
with a gleam now and then in his blue eyes. Leaning on his long
rifle, he paid no manner of attention to the angry voices near
by, — which conduct to me was little short of the marvellous.
“Now, Davy,” said he, at length, “the rest of your history.”
“There is little of it, sir,” I answered. "I was born in the
Yadkin country, lived alone with my father, who was a Scotchman.
He hated a man named Cameron, took me to Charlestown, and left me
with some kin of his who had a place called Temple Bow, and went
off to fight Cameron and the Cherokees.” There I gulped. "He was
killed at Cherokee Ford, and — and I ran away from Temple Bow, and
found Polly Ann.”
This time I caught something of surprise on the Colonel’s face.
“By thunder, Davy,” said he, “but you have a clean gift for
brief narrative. Where did you learn it?”
“My father was a gentleman once, and taught me to speak and
read,” I answered, as I brought a flat piece of limestone for
Polly Ann’s baking.
“And what would you like best to be when you grow up, Davy?” he
asked.
“Six feet,” said I, so promptly that he laughed.
“Faith,” said Polly Ann, looking at me comically, “he may be
many things, but I’ll warrant he’ll never be that.”
I have often thought since that young Mr. Clark showed much of
the wisdom of the famous king of Israel on that day. Polly Ann
cooked a piece of a deer which one of the woodsmen had with him,
and the quarrel died of itself when we sat down to this and the
johnny-cake. By noon we had taken up the trace for Harrodstown,
marching with scouts ahead and behind. Mr. Clark walked mostly
alone, seemingly wrapped in thought. At times he had short talks
with different men, oftenest — I noted with pride — with Tom
McChesney. And more than once when he halted he called me to him,
my answers to his questions seeming to amuse him. Indeed, I became
a kind of pet with the backwoodsmen, Cowan often flinging me to
his shoulder as he swung along. The pack was taken from the sorrel
mare and divided among the party, and Polly Ann made to ride that
we might move the faster.
It must have been the next afternoon, about four, that the rough
stockade of Harrodstown greeted our eyes as we stole cautiously to
the edge of the forest. And the sight of no roofs and spires could
have been more welcome than that of these logs and cabins,
broiling in the midsummer sun. At a little distance from the fort,
a silent testimony of siege, the stumpy, cleared fields were
overgrown with weeds, tall and rank, the corn choked. Nearer the
stockade, where the keepers of the fort might venture out at
times, a more orderly growth met the eye. It was young James Ray
whom Colonel Clark singled to creep with our message to the gates.
At six, when the smoke was rising from the stone chimneys behind
the palisades, Ray came back to say that all was well. Then we
went forward quickly, hands waved a welcome above the logs, the
great wooden gates swung open, and at last we had reached the
haven for which we had suffered so much. Mangy dogs barked at our
feet, men and women ran forward joyfully to seize our hands and
greet us.
And so we came to Kaintuckee.
THE old forts like Harrodstown and Boonesboro and Logan’s at St.
Asaph’s have long since passed away. It is many, many years since
I lived through that summer of siege in Harrodstown, the horrors
of it are faded and dim, the discomforts lost to a boy thrilled
with a new experience. I have read in my old age the books of
travellers in Kentucky, English and French, who wrote much of
squalor and strife and sin and little of those qualities that go
to the conquest of an empire and the making of a people. Perchance
my own pages may be colored by gratitude and love for the pioneers
amongst whom I found myself, and thankfulness to God that we had
reached them alive.
I know not how many had been cooped up in the little fort since
the early spring, awaiting the chance to go back to their
weed-choked clearings. The fort at Harrodstown was like an hundred
others I have since seen, but sufficiently surprising to me then.
Imagine a great parallelogram made of log cabins set end to end,
their common outside wall being the wall of the fort, and
loopholed. At the four corners of the parallelogram the cabins
jutted out, with ports in the angle in order to give a flanking
fire in case the savages reached the palisade. And then there were
huge log gates with watch-towers on either sides where sentries
sat day and night scanning the forest line. Within the fort was a
big common dotted with forest trees, where such cattle as had been
saved browsed on the scanty grass. There had been but the one
scrawny horse before our arrival.
And the settlers! How shall I describe them as they crowded
around us inside the gate? Some stared at us with sallow faces and
eyes brightened by the fever, yet others had the red glow of
health. Many of the men wore rough beards, unkempt, and yellow,
weather-worn hunting shirts, often stained with blood. The
barefooted women wore sunbonnets and loose homespun gowns, some of
linen made from nettles, while the children swarmed here and there
and everywhere in any costume that chance had given them. All
seemingly talking at once, they plied us with question after
question of the trace, the Watauga settlements, the news in the
Carolinys, and how the war went.
“A lad is it, this one,” said an Irish voice near me, “and a
woman! The dear help us, and who’d ’ave thought to see a woman
come over the mountain this year! Where did ye find them, Bill
Cowan?”
“Near the Crab Orchard, and the lad killed and sculped a
six-foot brave.”
“The Saints save us! And what’ll be his name?”
“Davy,” said my friend.
“Is it Davy? Sure his namesake killed a giant, too.”
“And is he come along, also?” said another. His shy blue eyes
and stiff blond hair gave him a strange appearance in a hunting
shirt.
“Hist to him! Who will ye be talkin’ about, Poulsson? Is it King
David ye mane?”
There was a roar of laughter, and this was my introduction to
Terence McCann and Swein Poulsson. The fort being crowded, we were
put into a cabin with Terence and Cowan and Cowan’s wife — a tall,
gaunt woman with a sharp tongue and a kind heart — and her four
brats, “All hugemsmug together,” as Cowan said. And that night we
supped upon dried buffalo meat and boiled nettle-tops, for of such
was the fare in Harrodstown that summer.
“Tom McChesney kept his faith.” One other man was to keep his
faith with the little community — George Rogers Clark. And I soon
learned that trustworthiness is held in greater esteem in a border
community than anywhere else. Of course, the love of the frontier
was in the grain of these men. But what did they come back to? Day
after day would the sun rise over the forest and beat down upon
the little enclosure in which we were penned. The row of cabins
leaning against the stockade marked the boundaries of our
diminutive world. Beyond them, invisible, lurked a relentless foe.
Within, the greater souls alone were calm, and a man’s worth was
set down to a hair’s breadth. Some were always to be found
squatting on their door-steps cursing the hour which had seen them
depart for this land; some wrestled and fought on the common, for
a fist fight with a fair field and no favor was a favorite
amusement of the backwoodsmen. My big friend, Cowan, was the
champion of these, and often of an evening the whole of the
inhabitants would gather near the spring to see him fight those
who had the courage to stand up to him. His muscles were like
hickory wood, and I have known a man insensible for a quarter of
an hour after one of his blows. Strangely enough, he never fought
in anger, and was the first to the spring for a gourd of water
after the fight was over. But Tom McChesney was the best wrestler
of the lot, and could make a wider leap than any other man in
Harrodstown.
Tom’s reputation did not end there, for he became one of the two
breadwinners of the station. I would better have said
meatwinners. Woe be to the incautious who, lulled by a week of
fancied security, ventured out into the dishevelled field for a
little food! In the early days of the siege man after man had gone
forth for game, never to return. Until Tom came, one only had been
successful, — that lad of seventeen, whose achievements were the
envy of my boyish soul, James Ray. He slept in the cabin next to
Cowan’s, and long before the dawn had revealed the forest line had
been wont to steal out of the gates on the one scrawny horse the
Indians had left them, gain the Salt River, and make his way
thence through the water to some distant place where the listening
savages could not hear his shot. And now Tom took his turn. Often
did I sit with Polly Ann till midnight in the sentry’s tower,
straining my ears for the owl’s hoot that warned us of his coming.
Sometimes he was empty-handed, but sometimes a deer hung limp and
black across his saddle, or a pair of turkeys swung from his
shoulder.
“Arrah, darlin’,” said Terence to Polly Ann, “’tis yer husband
and James is the jools av the fort. Sure I niver loved me father
as I do thim.”
I would have given kingdoms in those days to have been seventeen
and James Ray. When he was in the fort I dogged his footsteps, and
listened with a painful yearning to the stories of his escapes
from the roving bands. And as many a character is watered in its
growth by hero-worship, so my own grew firmer in the contemplation
of Ray’s resourcefulness. My strange life had far removed me from
lads of my own age, and he took a fancy to me, perhaps because of
the very persistence of my devotion to him. I cleaned his gun,
filled his powder flask, and ran to do his every bidding.
I used in the hot summer days to lie under the elm tree and
listen to the settlers’ talk about a man named Henderson, who had
bought a great part of Kentucky from the Indians, and had gone out
with Boone to found Boonesboro some two years before. They spoke
of much that I did not understand concerning the discountenance by
Virginia of these claims, speculating as to whether Henderson’s
grants were good. For some of them held these grants, and others
Virginia grants — a fruitful source of quarrel between them. Some
spoke, too, of Washington and his ragged soldiers going up and
down the old colonies and fighting for a freedom which there
seemed little chance of getting. But their anger seemed to blaze
most fiercely when they spoke of a mysterious British general
named Hamilton, whom they called "the ha’r buyer,” and who from
his stronghold in the north country across the great Ohio sent
down these hordes of savages to harry us. I learned to hate
Hamilton with the rest, and pictured him with the visage of a
fiend. We laid at his door every outrage that had happened at the
three stations, and put upon him the blood of those who had been
carried off to torture in the Indian villages of the northern
forests. And when — amidst great excitement — a spent runner would
arrive from Boonesboro or St. Asaph’s and beg Mr. Clark for a
squad, it was commonly with the first breath that came into his
body that he cursed Hamilton.
So the summer wore away, while we lived from hand to mouth on
such scanty fare as the two of them shot and what we could venture
to gather in the unkempt fields near the gates. A winter of famine
lurked ahead, and men were goaded near to madness at the thought
of clearings made and corn planted in the spring within reach of
their hands, as it were, and they might not harvest it. At length,
when a fortnight had passed, and Tom and Ray had gone forth day
after day without sight or fresh sign of Indians, the weight
lifted from our hearts. There were many things that might yet be
planted and come to maturity before the late Kentucky frosts.
The pressure within the fort, like a flood, opened the gates of it,
despite the sturdily disapproving figure of a young man who stood silent
under the sentry box, leaning on his Deckard. He was
Colonel George Rogers Clark,
Commander-in-chief of the backwoodsmen of Kentucky,
whose power was reenforced by that strange thing called an education. It
was this, no doubt, gave him command of words when he chose to use them.
“Faith,” said Terence, as we passed him, “’tis a foine man he
is, and a gintleman born. Wasn’t it him gathered the Convintion
here in Harrodstown last year that chose him and another to go to
the Virginia legislatoor? And him but a lad, ye might say. The
divil fly away wid his caution! Sure the redskins is as toired as
us, and gone home to the wives and childher, bad cess to thim.”
And so the first day the gates were opened we went into the
fields a little way; and the next day a little farther. They had
once seemed to me an unexplored and forbidden country as I
searched them with my eyes from the sentry boxes. And yet I felt a
shame to go with Polly Ann and Mrs. Cowan and the women while
James Ray and Tom sat with the guard of men between us and the
forest line. Like a child on a holiday, Polly Ann ran hither and
thither among the stalks, her black hair flying and a song on her
lips.
“Soon we’ll be having a little home of our own, Davy,” she
cried; "Tom has the place chose on a knoll by the river, and the
land is rich with hickory and pawpaw. I reckon we may be going
there next week.”
Caution being born into me with all the strength of a vice, I
said nothing. Whereupon she seized me in her strong hands and
shook me.
“Ye little imp!” said she, while the women paused in their work
to laugh at us.
“The boy is right, Polly Ann,” said Mrs. Harrod, “and he’s got
more sense than most of the men in the fort.”
“Ay, that he has,” the gaunt Mrs. Cowan put in, eying me
fiercely, while she gave one of her own offsprings a slap that
sent him spinning.
Whatever Polly Ann might have said would have been to the point,
but it was lost, for just then the sound of a shot came down the
wind, and a half a score of women stampeded through the stalks,
carrying me down like a reed before them. When I staggered to my
feet Polly Ann and Mrs. Cowan and Mrs. Harrod were standing alone.
For there was little of fear in those three.
“Shucks!” said Mrs. Cowan, “I reckon it’s that Jim Ray shooting
at a mark,” and she began to pick nettles again.
“Vimmen is a shy critter,” remarked Swein Poulsson, coming up. I
had a shrewd notion that he had run with the others.
“Wimmen!” Mrs. Cowan fairly roared. "Wimmen! Tell us how ye went
in March with the boys to fight the varmints at the Sugar Orchard,
Swein!”
We all laughed, for we loved him none the less. His little blue
eyes were perfectly solemn as he answered: —
“Ve send you fight Injuns mit your tongue, Mrs. Cowan. Then we
haf no more troubles.”
“Land of Canaan!” cried she, “I reckon I could do more harm with
it than you with a gun.”
There were many such false alarms in the bright days following,
and never a bullet sped from the shadow of the forest. Each day we
went farther afield, and each night trooped merrily in through the
gates with hopes of homes and clearings rising in our hearts — until
the motionless figure of the young Virginian met our eye. It was
then that men began to scoff at him behind his back, though some
spoke with sufficient backwoods bluntness to his face. And yet he
gave no sign of anger or impatience. Not so the other leaders. No
sooner did the danger seem past than bitter strife sprang up
within the walls. Even the two captains were mortal enemies. One
was Harrod, a tall, spare, dark-haired man of great endurance, — a
type of the best that conquered the land for the nation; the
other, that Hugh McGary of whom I have spoken, coarse and brutal,
if you like, but fearless and a leader of men withal.
A certain Sunday morning, I remember, broke with a cloud-flecked
sky, and as we were preparing to go afield with such ploughs as
could be got together (we were to sow turnips) the loud sounds of
a quarrel came from the elm at the spring. With one accord men and
women and children flocked thither, and as we ran we heard
McGary’s voice above the rest. Worming my way, boylike, through
the crowd, I came upon McGary and Harrod glaring at each other in
the centre of it.
“By Job! there’s no devil if I’ll stand back from my clearing
and waste the rest of the summer for the fears of a pack of
cowards. I’ll take a posse and march to Shawanee Springs this day,
and see any man a fair fight that tries to stop me.”
“And who’s in command here?” demanded Harrod.
“I am, for one,” said McGary, with an oath, “and my corn’s on
the ear. I’ve held back long enough, I tell you, and I’ll starve
this winter for you nor any one else.”
Harrod turned.
“Where’s Clark?” he said to Bowman.
“Clark!” roared McGary, “Clark be D—d. Ye’d think he was a
woman.” He strode up to Harrod until their faces almost touched,
and his voice shook with the intensity of his anger. "By G—d, you
nor Clark nor any one else will stop me, I say!” He swung around
and faced the people. “Come on, boys! We’ll fetch that corn, or
know the reason why.”
A responding murmur showed that the bulk of them were with him.
Weary of the pent-up life, longing for action, and starved for a
good meal, the anger of his many followers against Clark and
Harrod was nigh as great as his. He started roughly to shoulder
his way out, and whether from accident or design Captain Harrod
slipped in front of him, I never knew. The thing that followed
happened quickly as the catching of my breath. I saw McGary
powdering his pan, and Harrod his, and felt the crowd giving back
like buffalo. All at once the circle had vanished, and the two men
were standing not five paces apart with their rifles clutched
across their bodies, each watching, catlike, for the other to
level. It was a cry that startled us — and them. There was a vision
of a woman flying across the common, and we saw the dauntless Mrs.
Harrod snatching her husband’s gun from his resisting hands. So
she saved his life and McGary’s.
At this point Colonel Clark was seen coming from the gate. When
he got to Harrod and McGary the quarrel blazed up again, but now
it was between the three of them, and Clark took Harrod’s rifle
from Mrs. Harrod and held it. However, it was presently decided
that McGary should wait one more day before going to his clearing,
whereupon the gates were opened, the picked men going ahead to
take station as a guard, and soon we were hard at work, ploughing
here and mowing there, and in another place putting seed in the
ground: in the cheer of the work hardships were forgotten, and we
paused now and again to laugh at some sally of Terence McCann’s or
odd word of Swein Poulsson’s. As the day wore on to afternoon a
blue haze — harbinger of autumn — settled over fort and forest. Bees
hummed in the air as they searched hither and thither amongst the
flowers, or shot straight as a bullet for a distant hive. But
presently a rifle cracked, and we raised our heads.
“Hist!” said Terence, “the bhoys on watch is that warlike! Whin
there’s no redskins to kill they must be wastin’ good powdher on a
three.”
I leaped upon a stump and scanned the line of sentries between
us and the woods; only their heads and shoulders appeared above
the rank growth. I saw them looking from one to another
questioningly, some shouting words I could not hear. Then I saw
some running; and next, as I stood there wondering, came another
crack, and then a volley like the noise of a great fire licking
into dry wood, and things that were not bees humming round about.
A distant man in a yellow hunting shirt stumbled, and was drowned
in the tangle as in water. Around me men dropped plough-handles
and women baskets, and as we ran our legs grew numb and our bodies
cold at a sound which had haunted us in dreams by night — the
war-whoop. The deep and guttural song of it rose and fell with a
horrid fierceness. An agonized voice was in my ears, and I halted,
ashamed. It was Polly Ann’s.
“Davy!” she cried, “Davy, have ye seen Tom?”
Two men dashed by. I seized one by the fringe of his shirt, and
he flung me from my feet. The other leaped me as I knelt.
“Run, ye fools!” he shouted. But we stood still, with yearning
eyes staring back through the frantic forms for a sight of Tom’s.
“I’ll go back!” I cried, “I’ll go back for him. Do you run to
the fort.” For suddenly I seemed to forget my fear, nor did even
the hideous notes of the scalp halloo disturb me. Before Polly Ann
could catch me I had turned and started, stumbled, — I thought on a
stump, — and fallen headlong among the nettles with a stinging pain
in my leg. Staggering to my feet, I tried to run on, fell again,
and putting down my hand found it smeared with blood. A man came
by, paused an instant while his eye caught me, and ran on again. I
shall remember his face and name to my dying day; but there is no
reason to put it down here. In a few seconds’ space as I lay I
suffered all the pains of captivity and of death by torture, that
cry of savage man an hundred times more frightful than savage
beast sounding in my ears, and plainly nearer now by half the
first distance. Nearer, and nearer yet — and then I heard my name
called. I was lifted from the ground, and found myself in the
lithe arms of Polly Ann.
“Set me down!” I screamed, “set me down!” and must have added
some of the curses I had heard in the fort. But she clutched me
tightly (God bless the memory of those frontier women!), and flew
like a deer toward the gates. Over her shoulder I glanced back. A
spare three hundred yards away in a ragged line a hundred red
devils were bounding after us with feathers flying and mouths open
as they yelled. Again I cried to her to set me down; but though
her heart beat faster and her breath came shorter, she held me the
tighter. Second by second they gained on us, relentlessly. Were we
near the fort? Hoarse shouts answered the question, but they
seemed distant — too distant. The savages were gaining, and Polly
Ann’s breath quicker still. She staggered, but the brave soul had
no thought of faltering. I had a sight of a man on a plough horse
with dangling harness coming up from somewhere, of the man leaping
off, of ourselves being pitched on the animal’s bony back and
clinging there at the gallop, the man running at the side. Shots
whistled over our heads, and here was the brown fort. Its big
gates swung together as we dashed through the narrowed opening.
Then, as he lifted us off, I knew that the man who had saved us
was Tom himself. The gates closed with a bang, and a patter of
bullets beat against them like rain.
Through the shouting and confusion came a cry in a voice I knew,
now pleading, now commanding.
“Open, open! For God’s sake open!”
“It’s Ray! Open for Ray! Ray’s out!”
Some were seizing the bar to thrust it back when the heavy
figure of McGary crushed into the crowd beside it.
“By Job, I’ll shoot the man that touches it!” he shouted, as he
tore them away. But the sturdiest of them went again to it, and
cursed him. And while they fought backward and forward, the lad’s
mother, Mrs. Ray, cried out to them to open in tones to rend their
hearts. But McGary had gained the bar and swore (perhaps wisely)
that he would not sacrifice the station for one man. Where was
Ray?
Where was Ray, indeed? It seemed as if no man might live in the
hellish storm that raged without the walls: as if the very impetus
of hate and fury would carry the ravages over the stockade to
murder us. Into the turmoil at the gate came Colonel Clark,
sending the disputants this way and that to defend the fort,
McGary to command one quarter, Harrod and Bowman another, and
every man that could be found to a loophole, while Mrs. Ray
continued to run up and down, wringing her hands, now facing one
man, now another. Some of her words came to me, shrilly, above the
noise.
“He fed you — he fed you. Oh, my God, and you are
grateful — grateful! When you were starving he risked his life — "
Torn by anxiety for my friend, I dragged myself into the nearest
cabin, and a man was fighting there in the half-light at the port.
The huge figure I knew to be my friend Cowan’s, and when he drew
back to load I seized his arm, shouting Ray’s name. Although the
lead was pattering on the other side of the logs, Cowan lifted me
to the port. And there, stretched on the ground behind a stump,
within twenty feet of the walls, was James. Even as I looked the
puffs of dust at his side showed that the savages knew his refuge.
I saw him level and fire, and then Bill Cowan set me down and
began to ram in a charge with tremendous energy.
Was there no way to save Ray? I stood turning this problem in my
mind, subconsciously aware of Cowan’s movements: of his yells when
he thought he had made a shot, when Polly Ann appeared at the
doorway. Darting in, she fairly hauled me to the shake-down in the
far corner.
“Will ye bleed to death, Davy?” she cried, as she slipped off my
legging and bent over the wound. Her eye lighting on a gourdful of
water on the puncheon table, she tore a strip from her dress and
washed and bound me deftly. The bullet was in the flesh, and gave
me no great pain.
“Lie there, ye imp!” she commanded, when she had finished.
“Some one’s under the bed,” said I, for I had heard a movement.
In an instant we were down on our knees on the hard dirt floor,
and there was a man’s foot in a moccasin! We both grabbed it and
pulled, bringing to life a person with little blue eyes and stiff
blond hair.
“Swein Poulsson!” exclaimed Polly Ann, giving him an involuntary
kick, “may the devil give ye shame!”
Swein Poulsson rose to a sitting position and clasped his knees
in his hands.
“I haf one great fright,” said he.
“Send him into the common with the women in yere place, Mis’
McChesney,” growled Cowan, who was loading.
“By tam!” said Swein Poulsson, leaping to his feet, “I vill stay
here und fight. I am prave once again.” Stooping down, he searched
under the bed, pulled out his rifle, powdered the pan, and flying
to the other port, fired. At that Cowan left his post and snatched
the rifle from Poulsson’s hands.
“Ye’re but wasting powder,” he cried angrily.
“Then, by tam, I am as vell under the bed,” said Poulsson. "Vat
can I do?”
I had it.
“Dig!” I shouted; and seizing the astonished Cowan’s tomahawk
from his belt I set to work furiously chopping at the dirt beneath
the log wall. "Dig, so that James can get under.”
Cowan gave me the one look, swore a mighty oath, and leaping to
the port shouted to Ray in a thundering voice what we were doing.
“Dig!” roared Cowan. "Dig, for the love of God, for he can’t
hear me.”
The three of us set to work with all our might, Poulsson making
great holes in the ground at every stroke, Polly Ann scraping at
the dirt with the gourd. Two feet below the surface we struck the
edge of the lowest log, and then it was Poulsson who got into the
hole with his hunting knife — perspiring, muttering to himself,
working as one possessed with a fury, while we scraped out the
dirt from under him. At length, after what seemed an age of
staring at his legs, the ground caved on him, and he would have
smothered if we had not dragged him out by the heels, sputtering
and all powdered brown. But there was the daylight under the log.
Again Cowan shouted at Ray, and again, but he did not
understand. It was then the miracle happened. I have seen brave
men and cowards since, and I am as far as ever from distinguishing
them. Before we knew it Poulsson was in the hole once more — had
wriggled out of it on the other side, and was squirming in a hail
of bullets towards Ray. There was a full minute of
suspense — perhaps two — during which the very rifles of the fort were
silent (though the popping in the weeds was redoubled), and then
the barrel of a Deckard was poked through the hole. After it came
James Ray himself, and lastly Poulsson, and a great shout went out
from the loopholes and was taken up by the women in the common.
Swein Poulsson had become a hero, nor was he willing to lose any
of the glamour which was a hero’s right. As the Indians’ fire
slackened, he went from cabin to cabin, and if its occupants
failed to mention the exploit (some did fail so to do, out of
mischief), Swein would say: —
“You did not see me safe James, no? I vill tell you Joost how.”
It never leaked out that Swein was first of all under the bed,
for Polly Ann and Bill Cowan and myself swore to keep the secret.
But they told how I had thought of digging the hole under the
logs — a happy circumstance which got me a reputation for wisdom
beyond my years. There was a certain Scotchman at Harrodstown
called McAndrew, and it was he gave me the nickname "Canny Davy,”
and I grew to have a sort of precocious fame in the station. Often
Captain Harrod or Bowman or some of the others would pause in
their arguments and say gravely, “What does Davy think of it?”
This was not good for a boy, and the wonder of it is that it did
not make me altogether insupportable. One effect it had on me — to
make me long even more earnestly to be a man.
The impulse of my reputation led me farther. A fortnight of more
inactivity followed, and then we ventured out into the fields once
more. But I went with the guard this time, not with the
women, — thanks to a whim the men had for humoring me.
“Arrah, and beant he a man all but two feet,” said Terence, “wid
more brain than me an’ Bill Cowan and Poulsson togither? ’Tis a
fox’s nose Davy has for the divils, Bill. Sure he can smell thim
the same as you an’ me kin see the red paint on their faces.”
“I reckon that’s true,” said Bill Cowan, with solemnity, and so
he carried me off.
At length the cattle were turned out to browse greedily through
the clearing, while we lay in the woods by the forest and listened
to the sound of their bells, but when they strayed too far, I was
often sent to drive them back. Once when this happened I followed
them to the shade at the edge of the woods, for it was noon, and
the sun beat down fiercely. And there I sat for some time watching
them as they lashed their sides with their tails and pawed the
ground, for experience is a good master. Whether or not the flies
were all that troubled them I could not tell, and no sound save
the tinkle of their bells broke the noonday stillness. Making a
circle I drove them back toward the fort, much troubled in mind. I
told Cowan, but he laughed and said it was the flies. Yet I was
not satisfied, and finally stole back again to the place where I
had found them. I sat a long time hidden at the edge of the
forest, listening until my imagination tricked me into hearing
those noises which I feared and yet longed for. Trembling, I stole
a little farther in the shade of the woods, and then a little
farther still. The leaves rustled in the summer’s breeze, patches
of sunlight flickered on the mould, the birds twittered, and the
squirrels scolded. A chipmunk frightened me as he flew chattering
along a log. And yet I went on. I came to the creek as it flowed
silently in the shade, stepped in, and made my way slowly down it,
I know not how far, walking in the water, my eye alert to every
movement about me. At length I stopped and caught my breath.
Before me, in a glade opening out under great trees, what seemed a
myriad of forked sticks were piled against one another, three by
three, and it struck me all in a heap that I had come upon a great
encampment. But the skeletons of the pyramid tents alone remained.
Where were the skins? Was the camp deserted?
For a while I stared through the brier leaves, then I took a
venture, pushed on, and found myself in the midst of the place. It
must have held near a thousand warriors. All about me were gray
heaps of ashes, and bones of deer and elk and buffalo scattered,
some picked clean, some with the meat and hide sticking to them.
Impelled by a strong fascination, I went hither and thither until
a sound brought me to a stand — the echoing crack of a distant
rifle. On the heels of it came another, then several together, and
a faint shouting borne on the light wind. Terrorized, I sought for
shelter. A pile of brush underlain by ashes was by, and I crept
into that. The sounds continued, but seemed to come no nearer, and
my courage returning, I got out again and ran wildly through the
camp toward the briers on the creek, expecting every moment to be
tumbled headlong by a bullet. And when I reached the briers, what
between panting and the thumping of my heart I could for a few
moments hear nothing. Then I ran on again up the creek, heedless
of cover, stumbling over logs and trailing vines, when all at once
a dozen bronze forms glided with the speed of deer across my path
ahead. They splashed over the creek and were gone. Bewildered with
fear, I dropped under a fallen tree. Shouts were in my ears, and
the noise of men running. I stood up, and there, not twenty paces
away, was Colonel Clark himself rushing toward me. He halted with
a cry, raised his rifle, and dropped it at the sight of my queer
little figure covered with ashes.
“My God!” he cried, “it’s Davy.”
“They crossed the creek,” I shouted, pointing the way, “they
crossed the creek, some twelve of them.”
“Ay,” he said, staring at me, and by this time the rest of the
guard were come up. They too stared, with different exclamations
on their lips, — Cowan and Bowman and Tom McChesney and Terence
McCann in front.
“And there’s a great camp below,” I went on, “deserted, where a
thousand men have been.”
“A camp — deserted?” said Clark, quickly.
“Yes,” I said, “yes.” But he had already started forward and
seized me by the arm.
“Lead on,” he cried, “show it to us.” He went ahead with me,
travelling so fast that I must needs run to keep up, and fairly
lifting me over the logs. But when we came in sight of the place
he darted forward alone and went through it like a hound on the
trail. The others followed him, crying out at the size of the
place and poking among the ashes. At length they all took up the
trail for a way down the creek. Presently Clark called a halt.
“I reckon that they’ve made for the Ohio,” he said. And at this
judgment from him the guard gave a cheer that might almost have
been heard in the fields around the fort. The terror that had
hovered over us all that long summer was lifted at last.
You may be sure that Cowan carried me back to the station. "To
think it was Davy that found it!” he cried again and again, “to
think it was Davy found it!”
“And wasn’t it me that said he could smell the divils,” said
Terence, as he circled around us in a mimic war dance. And when
from the fort they saw us coming across the fields they opened the
gates in astonishment, and on hearing the news gave themselves
over to the wildest rejoicing. For the backwoodsmen were children
of nature. Bill Cowan ran for the fiddle which he had carried so
carefully over the mountain, and that night we had jigs and reels
on the common while the big fellow played "Billy of the Wild
Woods" and "Jump Juba,” with all his might, and the pine knots
threw their fitful, red light on the wild scenes of merriment. I
must have cut a queer little figure as I sat between Cowan and Tom
watching the dance, for presently Colonel Clark came up to us,
laughing in his quiet way.
“Davy,” said he, “there is another great man here who would like
to see you,” and led me away wondering. I went with him toward the
gate, burning all over with pride at this attention, and beside a
torch there a broad-shouldered figure was standing, at sight of
whom I had a start of remembrance.
“Do you know who that is, Davy?” said Colonel Clark.
“It’s Mr. Daniel Boone,” said I.
“By thunder,” said Clark, “I believe the boy IS a wizard,” while
Mr. Boone’s broad mouth was creased into a smile, and there was a
trace of astonishment, too, in his kindly eye.
“Mr. Boone came to my father’s cabin on the Yadkin once,” I
said; "he taught me to skin a deer.”
“Ay, that I did,” exclaimed Mr. Boone, “and I said ye’d make a
woodsman sometime.”
Mr. Boone, it seemed, had come over from Boonesboro to consult
with Colonel Clark on certain matters, and had but just arrived.
But so modest was he that he would not let it be known that he was
in the station, for fear of interrupting the pleasure. He was much
the same as I had known him, only grown older and his reputation
now increased to vastness. He and Clark sat on a door log talking
for a long time on Kentucky matters, the strength of the forts,
the prospect of new settlers that autumn, of the British policy,
and finally of a journey which Colonel Clark was soon to make back
to Virginia across the mountains. They seemed not to mind my
presence. At length Colonel Clark turned to me with that quiet,
jocose way he had when relaxed.
“Davy,” said he, “we’ll see how much of a general you are. What
would you do if a scoundrel named Hamilton far away at Detroit was
bribing all the redskins he could find north of the Ohio to come
down and scalp your men?”
“I’d go for Hamilton,” I answered.
“By God!” exclaimed Clark, striking Mr. Boone on the knee,
"that’s what I’d do.”
MR. BOONE’S visit lasted but a day. I was a great deal with
Colonel Clark in the few weeks that followed before his departure
for Virginia. He held himself a little aloof (as a leader should)
from the captains in the station, without seeming to offend them.
But he had a fancy for James Ray and for me, and he often took me
into the woods with him by day, and talked with me of an evening.
“I’m going away to Virginia, Davy,” he said; "will you not go
with me? We’ll see Williamsburg, and come back in the spring, and
I’ll have you a little rifle made.”
My look must have been wistful.
“I can’t leave Polly Ann and Tom,” I answered.
“Well,” he said, “I like that. Faith to your friends is a big
equipment for life.”
“But why are you going?” I asked.
“Because I love Kentucky best of all things in the world,” he
answered, smiling.
“And what are you going to do?” I insisted.
“Ah,” he said, “that I can’t tell even to you.”
“To catch Hamilton?” I ventured at random.
He looked at me queerly.
“Would you go along, Davy?” said he, laughing now.
“Would you take Tom?”
“Among the first,” answered Colonel Clark, heartily.
We were seated under the elm near the spring, and at that
instant I saw Tom coming toward us. I jumped up, thinking to
please him by this intelligence, when Colonel Clark pulled me down
again.
“Davy,” said he, almost roughly, I thought, “remember that we
have been joking. Do you understand? — joking. You have a tongue in
your mouth, but sense enough in your head, I believe, to hold it.”
He turned to Tom. "McChesney, this is a queer lad you brought us,”
said he.
“He’s a little deevil,” agreed Tom, for that had become a
formula with him.
It was all very mysterious to me, and I lay awake many a night
with curiosity, trying to solve a puzzle that was none of my
business. And one day, to cap the matter, two woodsmen arrived at
Harrodstown with clothes frayed and bodies lean from a long
journey. Not one of the hundred questions with which they were
beset would they answer, nor say where they had been or why, save
that they had carried out certain orders of Clark, who was locked
up with them in a cabin for several hours.
The first of October, the day of Colonel Clark’s departure,
dawned crisp and clear. He was to take with him the disheartened
and the cowed, the weaklings who loved neither work nor exposure
nor danger. And before he set out of the gate he made a little
speech to the assembled people.
“My friends,” he said, “you know me. I put the interests of
Kentucky before my own. Last year when I left to represent her at
Williamsburg there were some who said I would desert her. It was
for her sake I made that journey, suffered the tortures of hell
from scalded feet, was near to dying in the mountains. It was for
her sake that I importuned the governor and council for powder and
lead, and when they refused it I said to them, ’Gentlemen, a
country that is not worth defending is not worth claiming.’"
At these words the settlers gave a great shout, waving their
coonskin hats in the air.
“Ay, that ye did,” cried Bill Cowan, “and got the amminition.”
“I made that journey for her sake, I say,” Colonel Clark
continued, “and even so I am making this one. I pray you trust me,
and God bless and keep you while I am gone.”
He did not forget to speak to me as he walked between our lines,
and told me to be a good boy and that he would see me in the
spring. Some of the women shed tears as he passed through the
gate, and many of us climbed to sentry box and cabin roof that we
might see the last of the little company wending its way across
the fields. A motley company it was, the refuse of the station,
headed by its cherished captain. So they started back over the
weary road that led to that now far-away land of civilization and
safety.
During the balmy Indian summer, when the sharper lines of nature
are softened by the haze, some came to us from across the
mountains to make up for the deserters. From time to time a little
group would straggle to the gates of the station, weary and
footsore, but overjoyed at the sight of white faces again: the
fathers walking ahead with watchful eyes, the women and older
children driving the horses, and the babies slung to the pack in
hickory withes. Nay, some of our best citizens came to Kentucky
swinging to the tail of a patient animal. The Indians were still
abroad, and in small war parties darted hither and thither with
incredible swiftness. And at night we would gather at the fire
around our new emigrants to listen to the stories they had to
tell, — familiar stories to all of us. Sometimes it had been the
gobble of a wild turkey that had lured to danger, again a wood-owl
had cried strangely in the night.
Winter came, and passed — somehow. I cannot dwell here on the
tediousness of it, and the one bright spot it has left in my
memory concerns Polly Ann. Did man, woman, or child fall sick, it
was Polly Ann who nursed them. She had by nature the God-given
gift of healing, knew by heart all the simple remedies that
backwoods lore had inherited from the north of Ireland or borrowed
from the Indians. Her sympathy and loving-kindness did more than
these, her never tiring and ever cheerful watchfulness. She was
deft, too, was Polly Ann, and spun from nettle bark many a cut of
linen that could scarce be told from flax. Before the sap began to
run again in the maples there was not a soul in Harrodstown who
did not love her, and I truly believe that most of them would have
risked their lives to do her bidding.
Then came the sugaring, the warm days and the freezing nights
when the earth stirs in her sleep and the taps drip from red
sunrise to red sunset. Old and young went to the camps, the women
and children boiling and graining, the squads of men posted in
guards round about. And after that the days flew so quickly that
it seemed as if the woods had burst suddenly into white flower,
and it was spring again. And then — a joy to be long remembered — I
went on a hunting trip with Tom and Cowan and three others where
the Kentucky tumbles between its darkly wooded cliffs. And other
wonders of that strange land I saw then for the first time: great
licks, trampled down for acres by the wild herds, where the salt
water oozes out of the hoofprints. On the edge of one of these
licks we paused and stared breathless at giant bones sticking here
and there in the black mud, and great skulls of fearful beasts
half-embedded. This was called the Big Bone Lick, and some
travellers that went before us had made their tents with the
thighs of these monsters of a past age.
A danger past is oft a danger forgotten. Men went out to build
the homes of which they had dreamed through the long winter. Axes
rang amidst the white dogwoods and the crabs and redbuds, and
there were riotous log-raisings in the clearings. But I think the
building of Tom’s house was the most joyous occasion of all, and
for none in the settlement would men work more willingly than for
him and Polly Ann. The cabin went up as if by magic. It stood on a
rise upon the bank of the river in a grove of oaks and hickories,
with a big persimmon tree in front of the door. It was in the
shade of this tree that Polly Ann sat watching Tom and me through
the mild spring days as we barked the roof, and none ever felt
greater joy and pride in a home than she. We had our first supper
on a wide puncheon under the persimmon tree on the few pewter
plates we had fetched across the mountain, the blue smoke from our
own hearth rising in the valley until the cold night air spread it
out in a line above us, while the horses grazed at the river’s
edge.
After that we went to ploughing, an occupation which Tom fancied
but little, for he loved the life of a hunter best of all. But
there was corn to be raised and fodder for the horses, and a
truck-patch to be cleared near the house.
One day a great event happened, — and after the manner of many
great events, it began in mystery. Leaping on the roan mare, I was
riding like mad for Harrodstown to fetch Mrs. Cowan. And she, when
she heard the summons, abandoned a turkey on the spit, pitched her
brats out of the door, seized the mare, and dashing through the
gates at a gallop left me to make my way back afoot. Scenting a
sensation, I hurried along the wooded trace at a dog trot, and
when I came in sight of the cabin there was Mrs. Cowan sitting on
the step, holding in her long but motherly arms something bundled
up in nettle linen, while Tom stood sheepishly by, staring at it.
“Shucks,” Mrs. Cowan was saying loudly, “I reckon ye’re as
little use to-day as Swein Poulsson, — standin’ there on one foot.
Ye anger me — just grinning at it like a fool — and yer own doin’.
Have ye forgot how to talk?”
Tom grinned the more, but was saved the effort of a reply by a
loud noise from the bundle.
“Here’s another,” cried Mrs. Cowan to me. "Ye needn’t act as if
it was an animal. Faith, yereself was like that once, all red an’
crinkled. But I warrant ye didn’t have the heft,” and she lifted
it, judicially. "A grand baby,” attacking Tom again, “and ye’re no
more worthy to be his father than Davy here.”
Then I heard a voice calling me, and pushing past Mrs. Cowan, I
ran into the cabin. Polly Ann lay on the log bedstead, and she
turned to mine a face radiant with a happiness I had not imagined.
“Oh, Davy, have ye seen him? Have ye seen little Tom? Davy, I
reckon I’ll never be so happy again. Fetch him here, Mrs. Cowan.”
Mrs. Cowan, with a glance of contempt at Tom and me, put the
bundle tenderly down on the coarse brown sheet beside her.
Poor little Tom! Only the first fortnight of his existence was
spent in peace. I have a pathetic memory of it all — of our little
home, of our hopes for it, of our days of labor and nights of
planning to make it complete. And then, one morning when the three
of us were turning over the black loam in the patch, while the
baby slept peacefully in the shade, a sound came to our ears that
made us pause and listen with bated breath. It was the sound of
many guns, muffled in the distant forest. With a cry Polly Ann
flew to the hickory cradle under the tree, Tom sprang for the
rifle that was never far from his side, while with a kind of
instinct I ran to catch the spancelled horses by the river. In
silence and sorrow we fled through the tall cane, nor dared to
take one last look at the cabin, or the fields lying black in the
spring sunlight. The shots had ceased, but ere we had reached the
little clearing McCann had made they began again, though as
distant as before. Tom went ahead, while I led the mare and Polly
Ann clutched the child to her breast. But when we came in sight of
the fort across the clearings the gates were closed. There was
nothing to do but cower in the thicket, listening while the battle
went on afar, Polly Ann trying to still the cries of the child,
lest they should bring death upon us. At length the shooting
ceased; stillness reigned; then came a faint halloo, and out of
the forest beyond us a man rode, waving his hat at the fort. After
him came others. The gates opened, and we rushed pell-mell across
the fields to safety.
The Indians had shot at a party shelling corn at Captain
Bowman’s plantation, and killed two, while the others had taken
refuge in the crib. Fired at from every brake, James Ray had
ridden to Harrodstown for succor, and the savages had been beaten
off. But only the foolhardy returned to their clearings now. We
were on the edge of another dreaded summer of siege, the prospect
of banishment from the homes we could almost see, staring us in
the face, and the labors of the spring lost again. There was
bitter talk within the gates that night, and many declared angrily
that Colonel Clark had abandoned us. But I remembered what he had
said, and had faith in him.
It was that very night, too, I sat with Cowan, who had duty in
one of the sentry boxes, and we heard a voice calling softly under
us. Fearing treachery, Cowan cried out for a sign. Then the answer
came back loudly to open to a runner with a message from Colonel
Clark to Captain Harrod. Cowan let the man in, while I ran for the
captain, and in five minutes it seemed as if every man and woman
and child in the fort were awake and crowding around the man by
the gates, their eager faces reddened by the smoking pine knots.
Where was Clark? What had he been doing? Had he deserted them?
“Deserted ye!” cried the runner, and swore a great oath. Wasn’t
Clark even then on the Ohio raising a great army with authority
from the Commonwealth of Virginia to rid them of the red scourge?
And would they desert him? Or would they be men and bring from
Harrodstown the company he asked for? Then Captain Harrod read the
letter asking him to raise the company, and before day had dawned
they were ready for the word to march — ready to leave cabin and
clearing, and wife and child, trusting in Clark’s judgment for
time and place. Never were volunteers mustered more quickly than
in that cool April night by the gates of Harrodstown Station.
“And we’ll fetch Davy along, for luck,” cried Cowan, catching
sight of me beside him.
“Sure we’ll be wanting a dhrummer b’y,” said McCann.
And so they enrolled me.
“DAVY, take care of my Tom,” cried Polly Ann.
I can see her now, standing among the women by the great hewn
gateposts, with little Tom in her arms, holding him out to us as
we filed by. And the vision of his little, round face haunted Tom
and me for many weary miles of our tramp through the wilderness. I
have often thought since that that march of the volunteer company
to join Clark at the Falls of the Ohio was a superb example of
confidence in one man, and scarce to be equalled in history.
In less than a week we of Captain Harrod’s little company stood
on a forest-clad bank, gazing spellbound at the troubled waters of
a mighty river. That river was the Ohio, and it divided us from
the strange north country whence the savages came. From below, the
angry voice of the Great Falls cried out to us unceasingly. Smoke
rose through the tree-tops of the island opposite, and through the
new gaps of its forest cabins could be seen. And presently, at a
signal from us, a big flatboat left its shore, swung out and
circled on the polished current, and grounded at length in the mud
below us. A dozen tall boatmen, buckskin-clad, dropped the big
oars and leaped out on the bank with a yell of greeting. At the
head of them was a man of huge frame, and long, light hair falling
down over the collar of his hunting shirt. He wrung Captain
Harrod’s hand.
“That there’s Simon Kenton, Davy,” said Cowan, as we stood
watching them.
I ran forward for a better look at the backwoods Hercules, the
tales of whose prowess had helped to while away many a winter’s
night in Harrodstown Station. Big-featured and stern, yet he had
the kindly eye of the most indomitable of frontier fighters, and I
doubted not the truth of what was said of him — that he could kill
any redskin hand-to-hand.
“Clark’s thar,” he was saying to Captain Harrod. "God knows what
his pluck is. He ain’t said a word.”
“He doesn’t say whar he’s going?” said Harrod.
“Not a notion,” answered Kenton. "He’s the greatest man to keep
his mouth shut I ever saw. He kept at the governor of Virginny
till he gave him twelve hundred pounds in Continentals and power
to raise troops. Then Clark fetched a circle for Fort Pitt, raised
some troops thar and in Virginny and some about Red Stone, and
come down the Ohio here with ’em in a lot of flatboats. Now that
ye’ve got here the Kentucky boys is all in. I come over with
Montgomery, and Dillard’s here from the Holston country with a
company.”
“Well,” said Captain Harrod, “I reckon we’ll report.”
I went among the first boat-load, and as the men strained
against the current, Kenton explained that Colonel Clark had
brought a number of emigrants down the river with him; that he
purposed to leave them on this island with a little force, that
they might raise corn and provisions during the summer; and that
he had called the place Corn Island.
“Sure, there’s the Colonel himself,” cried Terence McCann, who
was in the bow, and indeed I could pick out the familiar figure
among the hundred frontiersmen that gathered among the stumps at
the landing-place. As our keel scraped they gave a shout that
rattled in the forest behind them, and Clark came down to the
waterside.
“I knew that Harrodstown wouldn’t fail me,” he said, and called
every man by name as we waded ashore. When I came splashing along
after Tom he pulled me from the water with his two hands.
“Colonel,” said Terence McCann, “we’ve brought ye a dhrummer
b’y.”
“We’d have no luck at all without him,” said Cowan, and the men
laughed.
“Can you walk an hundred miles without food, Davy?” asked
Colonel Clark, eying me gravely.
“Faith he’s lean as a wolf, and no stomach to hinder him,” said
Terence, seeing me look troubled. "I’ll not be missing the bit of
food the likes of him would eat.”
“And as for the heft of him,” added Cowan, “Mac and I’ll not
feel it.”
Colonel Clark laughed. "Well, boys,” he said, “if you must have
him, you must. His Excellency gave me no instructions about a
drummer, but we’ll take you, Davy.”
In those days he was a man that wasted no time, was Colonel
Clark, and within the hour our little detachment had joined the
others, felling trees and shaping the log-ends for the cabins.
That night, as Tom and Cowan and McCann and James Ray lay around
their fire, taking a well-earned rest, a man broke excitedly into
the light with a kettle-shaped object balanced on his head, which
he set down in front of us. The man proved to be Swein Poulsson,
and the object a big drum, and he straightway began to beat upon
it a tattoo with improvised drumsticks.
“A Red Stone man,” he cried, “a Red Stone man, he have it in the
flatboat. It is for Tavy.”
“The saints be good to us,” said Terence, “if it isn’t the
King’s own drum he has.” And sure enough, on the head of it
gleamed the royal arms of England, and on the other side, as we
turned it over, the device of a regiment. They flung the sling
about my neck, and the next day, when the little army drew up for
parade among the stumps, there I was at the end of the line, and
prouder than any man in the ranks. And Colonel Clark coming to my
end of the line paused and smiled and patted me kindly on the
cheek.
“Have you put this man on the roll, Harrod?” says he.
“No, Colonel,” answers Captain Harrod, amid the laughter of the
men at my end.
“What!” says the Colonel, “what an oversight! From this day he
is drummer boy and orderly to the Commander-in-chief. Beat the
retreat, my man.”
I did my best, and as the men broke ranks they crowded around
me, laughing and joking, and Cowan picked me up, drum and all, and
carried me off, I rapping furiously the while.
And so I became a kind of handy boy for the whole regiment from
the Colonel down, for I was willing and glad to work. I cooked the
Colonel’s meals, roasting the turkey breasts and saddles of
venison that the hunters brought in from the mainland, and even
made him journey-cake, a trick which Polly Ann had taught me. And
when I went about the island, if a man were loafing, he would
seize his axe and cry, “Here’s Davy, he’ll tell the Colonel on
me.” Thanks to the jokes of Terence McCann, I gained an owl-like
reputation for wisdom amongst these superstitious backwoodsmen,
and they came verily to believe that upon my existence depended
the success of the campaign. But day after day passed, and no sign
from Colonel Clark of his intentions.
“There’s a good lad,” said Terence. "He’ll be telling us where
we’re going.”
I was asked the same question by a score or more, but Colonel
Clark kept his own counsel. He himself was everywhere during the
days that followed, superintending the work on the blockhouse we
were building, and eying the men. Rumor had it that he was sorting
out the sheep from the goats, silently choosing those who were to
remain on the island and those who were to take part in the
campaign.
At length the blockhouse stood finished amid the yellow stumps
of the great trees, the trunks of which were in its walls. And
suddenly the order went forth for the men to draw up in front of
it by companies, with the families of the emigrants behind them.
It was a picture to fix itself in a boy’s mind, and one that I
have never forgotten. The line of backwoodsmen, as fine a lot of
men as I ever wish to see, bronzed by the June sun, strong and
tireless as the wild animals of the forest, stood expectant with
rifles grounded. And beside the tallest, at the end of the line,
was a diminutive figure with a drum hung in front of it. The early
summer wind rustled in the forest, and the never ending song of
the Great Falls sounded from afar. Apart, square-shouldered and
indomitable, stood a young man of twenty-six.
“My friends and neighbors,” he said in a firm voice, “there is
scarce a man standing among you to-day who has not suffered at the
hands of savages. Some of you have seen wives and children killed
before your eyes — or dragged into captivity. None of you can to-day
call the home for which he has risked so much his own. And who, I
ask you, is to blame for this hideous war? Whose gold is it that
buys guns and powder and lead to send the Shawnee and the Iroquois
and Algonquin on the warpath?”
He paused, and a hoarse murmur of anger ran along the ranks.
“Whose gold but George’s, by the grace of God King of Great
Britain and Ireland? And what minions distribute it? Abbott at
Kaskaskia, for one, and Hamilton at Detroit, the Hair Buyer, for
another!”
When he spoke Hamilton’s name his voice was nearly drowned by
imprecations.
“Silence!” cried Clark, sternly, and they were silent. "My
friends, the best way for a man to defend himself is to maim his
enemy. One year since, when you did me the honor to choose me
Commander-in-chief of your militia in Kentucky, I sent two scouts
to Kaskaskia. A dozen years ago the French owned that place, and
St. Vincent, and Detroit, and the people there are still French.
My men brought back word that the French feared the Long Knives,
as the Indians call us. On the first of October I went to
Virginia, and some of you thought again that I had deserted you. I
went to Williamsburg and wrestled with Governor Patrick Henry and
his council, with Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Mason and Mr. Wythe.
Virginia had no troops to send us, and her men were fighting
barefoot with Washington against the armies of the British king.
But the governor gave me twelve hundred pounds in paper, and with
it I have raised the little force that we have here. And with it
we will carry the war into Hamilton’s country. On the swift waters
of this great river which flows past us have come tidings to-day,
and God Himself has sent them. To-morrow would have been too late.
The ships and armies of the French king are on their way across
the ocean to help us fight the tyrant, and this is the news that
we bear to the Kaskaskias. When they hear this, the French of
those towns will not fight against us. My friends, we are going to
conquer an empire for liberty, and I can look onward,” he cried in
a burst of inspired eloquence, sweeping his arm to the northward
toward the forests on the far side of the Ohio, “I can look onward
to the day when these lands will be filled with the cities of a
Great Republic. And who among you will falter at such a call?”
There was a brief silence, and then a shout went up from the
ranks that drowned the noise of the Falls, and many fell into
antics, some throwing their coonskin hats in the air, and others
cursing and scalping Hamilton in mockery, while I pounded on the
drum with all my might. But when we had broken ranks the rumor was
whispered about that the Holston company had not cheered, and
indeed the rest of the day these men went about plainly morose and
discontented, — some saying openly (and with much justice, though we
failed to see it then) that they had their own families and
settlements to defend from the Southern Indians and Chickamauga
bandits, and could not undertake Kentucky’s fight at that time.
And when the enthusiasm had burned away a little the disaffection
spread, and some even of the Kentuckians began to murmur against
Clark, for faith or genius was needful to inspire men to his plan.
One of the malcontents from Boonesboro came to our fire to argue.
“He’s mad as a medicine man, is Clark, to go into that country
with less than two hundred rifles. And he’ll force us, will he?
I’d as lief have the King for a master.”
He brought every man in our circle to his feet, — Ray, McCann,
Cowan, and Tom. But Tom was nearest, and words not coming easily
to him he fell on the Boonesboro man instead, and they fought it
out for ten minutes in the firelight with half the regiment around
them. At the end of it, when the malcontents were carrying their
champion away, they were stopped suddenly at the sight of one
bursting through the circle into the light, and a hush fell upon
the quarrel. It was Colonel Clark.
“Are you hurt, McChesney?” he demanded.
“I reckon not much, Colonel,” said Tom, grinning, as he wiped
his face.
“If any man deserts this camp to-night,” cried Colonel Clark,
swinging around, “I swear by God to have him chased and brought
back and punished as he deserves. Captain Harrod, set a guard.”
I pass quickly over the rest of the incident. How the Holston
men and some others escaped in the night in spite of our guard,
and swam the river on logs. How at dawn we found them gone, and
Kenton and Harrod and brave Captain Montgomery set out in pursuit,
with Cowan and Tom and Ray. All day they rode, relentless, and the
next evening returned with but eight weary and sullen fugitives of
all those who had deserted.
The next day the sun rose on a smiling world, the polished
reaches of the river golden mirrors reflecting the forest’s green.
And we were astir with the light, preparing for our journey into
the unknown country. At seven we embarked by companies in the
flatboats, waving a farewell to those who were to be left behind.
Some stayed through inclination and disaffection: others because
Colonel Clark did not deem them equal to the task. But Swein
Poulsson came. With tears in his little blue eyes he had begged
the Colonel to take him, and I remember him well on that June
morning, his red face perspiring under the white bristles of his
hair as he strained at the big oar. For we must needs pull a mile
up the stream ere we could reach the passage in which to shoot
downward to the Falls. Suddenly Poulsson dropped his handle,
causing the boat to swing round in the stream, while the men
damned him. Paying them no attention, he stood pointing into the
blinding disk of the sun. Across the edge of it a piece was bitten
out in blackness.
“Mein Gott!” he cried, “the world is being ended just now.”
“The holy saints remember us this day!” said McCann, missing a
stroke to cross himself. "Will ye pull, ye damned Dutchman? Or
we’ll be the first to slide into hell. This is no kind of a place
at all at all.”
By this time the men all along the line of boats had seen it,
and many faltered. Clark’s voice could be heard across the waters
urging them to pull, while the bows swept across the current. They
obeyed him, but steadily the blackness ate out the light, and a
weird gloaming overspread the scene. River and forest became
stern, the men silent. The more ignorant were in fear of a
cataclysm, the others taking it for an omen.
“Shucks!” said Tom, when appealed to, “I’ve seed it afore, and
it come all right again.”
Clark’s boat rounded the shoal: next our turn came, and then the
whole line was gliding down the river, the rising roar of the
angry waters with which we were soon to grapple coming to us with
an added grimness. And now but a faint rim of light saved us from
utter darkness. Big Bill Cowan, undaunted in war, stared at me
with fright written on his face.
“And what ’ll ye think of it, Davy?” he said.
I glanced at the figure of our commander in the boat ahead, and
took courage.
“It’s Hamilton’s scalp hanging by a lock,” I answered, pointing
to what was left of the sun. "Soon it will be off, and then we’ll
have light again.”
To my surprise he snatched me from the thwart and held me up
with a shout, and I saw Colonel Clark turn and look back.
“Davy says the Ha’r Buyer’s sculp hangs by the lock, boys,” he
shouted, pointing at the sun.
The word was cried from boat to boat, and we could see the men
pointing upwards and laughing. And then, as the light began to
grow, we were in the midst of the tumbling waters, the steersmen
straining now right, now left, to keep the prows in the smooth
reaches between rock and bar. We gained the still pools below, the
sun came out once more and smiled on the landscape, and the
spirits of the men, reviving, burst all bounds.
Thus I earned my reputation as a prophet.
Four days and nights we rowed down the great river, our oars
double-manned, for fear that our coming might be heralded to the
French towns. We made our first camp on a green little island at
the mouth of the Cherokee, as we then called the Tennessee, and
there I set about cooking a turkey for Colonel Clark, which Ray
had shot. Chancing to look up, I saw the Colonel himself watching
me.
“How is this, Davy?” said he. "I hear that you have saved my
army for me before we have met the enemy.”
“I did not know it, sir,” I answered.
“Well,” said he, “if you have learned to turn an evil omen into
a good sign, you know more than some generals. What ails you now?”
“There’s a pirogue, sir,” I cried, staring and pointing.
“Where?” said he, alert all at once. "Here, McChesney, take a
crew and put out after them.”
He had scarcely spoken ere Tom and his men were rowing into the
sunset, the whole of our little army watching from the bank.
Presently the other boat was seen coming back with ours, and five
strange woodsmen stepped ashore, our men pressing around them. But
Clark flew to the spot, the men giving back.
“Who’s the leader here?” he demanded.
A tall man stepped forward.
“I am,” said he, bewildered but defiant.
“Your name?”
“John Duff,” he answered, as though against his will.
“Your business?”
“Hunters,” said Duff; "and I reckon we’re in our rights.”
“I’ll judge of that,” said our Colonel. "Where are you from?”
“That’s no secret, neither. Kaskasky, ten days gone.”
At that there was a murmur of surprise from our companies. Clark
turned.
“Get your men back,” he said to the captains, who stood about
them. And all of them not moving: "Get your men back, I say. I’ll
have it known who’s in command here.”
At that the men retired. "Who commands at Kaskaskia?” he
demanded of Duff.
“Monseer Rocheblave, a Frenchy holding a British commission,”
said Duff. "And the British Governor Abbott has left Post St.
Vincent and gone to Detroit. Who be you?” he added suspiciously.
"Be you Rebels?”
“Colonel Clark is my name, and I am in the service of the
Commonwealth of Virginia.”
Duff uttered an exclamatory oath and his manner changed. "Be you
Clark?” he said with respect. "And you’re going after Kaskasky?
Wal, the mility is prime, and the Injun scouts is keeping a good
lookout. But, Colonel, I’ll tell ye something: the Frenchies is
etarnal afeard of the Long Knives. My God! they’ve got the notion
that if you ketch ’em you’ll burn and scalp ’em same as the Red
Sticks.”
“Good,” was all that Clark answered.
“I reckon I don’t know much about what the Rebels is fighting
for,” said John Duff; "but I like your looks, Colonel, and
wharever you’re going there’ll be a fight. Me and my boys would
kinder like to go along.”
Clark did not answer at once, but looked John Duff and his men
over carefully.
“Will you take the oath of allegiance to Virginia and the
Continental Congress?” he asked at length.
“I reckon it won’t pizen us,” said John Duff.
“Hold up your hands,” said Clark, and they took the oath. "Now,
my men,” said he, “you will be assigned to companies. Does any one
among you know the old French trail from Massacre to Kaskaskia?”
“Why,” exclaimed John Duff, “why, Johnny Saunders here can tread
it in the dark like the road to the grogshop.”
John Saunders, loose limbed, grinning sheepishly, shuffled
forward, and Clark shot a dozen questions at him one after
another. Yes, the trail had been blazed the Lord knew how long ago
by the French, and given up when they left Massacre.
“Look you,” said Clark to him, “I am not a man to stand
trifling. If there is any deception in this, you will be shot
without mercy.”
“And good riddance,” said John Duff. "Boys, we’re Rebels now.
Steer clear of the Ha’r Buyer.”
FOR one more day we floated downward on the face of the waters
between the forest walls of the wilderness, and at length we
landed in a little gully on the north shore of the river, and
there we hid our boats.
“Davy,” said Colonel Clark, “let’s walk about a bit. Tell me
where you learned to be so silent?”
“My father did not like to be talked to,” I answered, “except
when he was drinking.”
He gave me a strange look. Many the stroll I took with him
afterwards, when he sought to relax himself from the cares which
the campaign had put upon him. This night was still and clear, the
west all yellow with the departing light, and the mists coming on
the river. And presently, as we strayed down the shore we came
upon a strange sight, the same being a huge fort rising from the
waterside, all overgrown with brush and saplings and tall weeds.
The palisades that held its earthenwork were rotten and crumbling,
and the mighty bastions of its corners sliding away. Behind the
fort, at the end farthest from the river, we came upon gravelled
walks hidden by the rank growth, where the soldiers of his Most
Christian Majesty once paraded. Lost in thought, Clark stood on
the parapet, watching the water gliding by until the darkness hid
it, — nay, until the stars came and made golden dimples upon its
surface. But as we went back to the camp again he told me how the
French had tried once to conquer this vast country and failed,
leaving to the Spaniards the endless stretch beyond the
Mississippi called Louisiana, and this part to the English. And he
told me likewise that this fort in the days of its glory had been
called Massacre, from a bloody event which had happened there more
than three-score years before.
“Threescore years!” I exclaimed, longing to see the men of this
race which had set up these monuments only to abandon them.
“Ay, lad,” he answered, “before you or I were born, and before
our fathers were born, the French missionaries and soldiers
threaded this wilderness. And they called this river ’La Belle
Riviere,’ — the Beautiful River.”
“And shall I see that race at Kaskaskia?” I asked, wondering.
“That you shall,” he cried, with a force that left no doubt in
my mind.
In the morning we broke camp and started off for the strange
place which we hoped to capture. A hundred miles it was across the
trackless wilds, and each man was ordered to carry on his back
provisions for four days only.
“Herr Gott!” cried Swein Poulsson, from the bottom of a
flatboat, whence he was tossing out venison flitches, “four day,
und vat is it ve eat then?”
“Frenchies, sure,” said Terence; "there’ll be plenty av thim for
a season. Faith, I do hear they’re tinder as lambs.”
“You’ll no set tooth in the Frenchies,” the pessimistic McAndrew
put in, “wi’ five thousand redskins aboot, and they lying in wait.
The Colonel’s no vera mindful of that, I’m thinking.”
“Will ye hush, ye ill-omened hound!” cried Cowan, angrily.
"Pitch him in the crick, Mac!”
Tom was diverted from this duty by a loud quarrel between
Captain Harrod and five men of the company who wanted scout duty,
and on the heels of that came another turmoil occasioned by
Cowan’s dropping my drum into the water. While he and McCann and
Tom were fishing it out, Colonel Clark himself appeared, quelled
the mutiny that Harrod had on his hands, and bade the men sternly
to get into ranks.
“What foolishness is this?” he said, eying the dripping drum.
“Sure, Colonel,” said McCann, swinging it on his back, “we’d
have no heart in us at Kaskasky widout the rattle of it in our
ears. Bill Cowan and me will not be feeling the heft of it bechune
us.”
“Get into ranks,” said the Colonel, amusement struggling with
the anger in his face as he turned on his heel. His wisdom well
knew when to humor a man, and when to chastise.
“Arrah,” said Terence, as he took his place, “I’d as soon l’ave
me gun behind as Davy and the dhrum.”
Methinks I can see now, as I write, the long file of woodsmen
with their swinging stride, planting one foot before the other,
even as the Indian himself threaded the wilderness. Though my legs
were short, I had both sinew and training, and now I was at one
end of the line and now at the other. And often with a laugh some
giant would hand his gun to a neighbor, swing me to his shoulder,
and so give me a lift for a weary mile or two; and perchance
whisper to me to put down my hand into the wallet of his shirt,
where I would find a choice morsel which he had saved for his
supper. Sometimes I trotted beside the Colonel himself, listening
as he talked to this man or that, and thus I got the gravest
notion of the daring of this undertaking, and of the dangers ahead
of us. This north country was infested with Indians, allies of the
English and friends of the French their subjects; and the fact was
never for an instant absent from our minds that our little band
might at any moment run into a thousand warriors, be overpowered
and massacred; or, worst of all, that our coming might have been
heralded to Kaskaskia.
For three days we marched in the green shade of the primeval
wood, nor saw the sky save in blue patches here and there. Again
we toiled for hours through the coffee-colored waters of the
swamps. But the third day brought us to the first of those strange
clearings which the French call prairies, where the long grass
ripples like a lake in the summer wind. Here we first knew raging
thirst, and longed for the loam-specked water we had scorned, as
our tired feet tore through the grass. For Saunders, our guide,
took a line across the open in plain sight of any eye that might
be watching from the forest cover. But at length our column
wavered and halted by reason of some disturbance at the head of
it. Conjectures in our company, the rear guard, became rife at
once.
“Run, Davy darlin,’ an’ see what the throuble is,” said Terence.
Nothing loath, I made my way to the head of the column, where
Bowman’s company had broken ranks and stood in a ring up to their
thighs in the grass. In the centre of the ring, standing on one
foot before our angry Colonel, was Saunders.
“Now, what does this mean?” demanded Clark; "my eye is on you,
and you’ve boxed the compass in this last hour.”
Saunders’ jaw dropped.
“I’m guiding you right,” he answered, with that sullenness which
comes to his kind from fear, “but a man will slip his bearings
sometimes in this country.”
Clark’s eyes shot fire, and he brought down the stock of his
rifle with a thud.
“By the eternal God!” he cried, “I believe you are a traitor.
I’ve been watching you every step, and you’ve acted strangely this
morning.”
“Ay, ay,” came from the men round him.
“Silence!” cried Clark, and turned again to the cowering
Saunders. "You pretend to know the way to Kaskaskia, you bring us
to the middle of the Indian country where we may be wiped out at
any time, and now you have the damned effrontery to tell me that
you have lost your way. I am a man of my word,” he added with a
vibrant intensity, and pointed to the limbs of a giant tree which
stood at the edge of the distant forest. "I will give you half an
hour, but as I live, I will leave you hanging there.”
The man’s brown hand trembled as he clutched his rifle barrel.
“’Tis a hard country, sir,” he said. "I’m lost. I swear it on
the evangels.”
“A hard country!” cried Clark. "A man would have to walk over it
but once to know it. I believe you are a damned traitor and
perjurer, — in spite of your oath, a British spy.”
Saunders wiped the sweat from his brow on his buckskin sleeve.
“I reckon I could get the trace, Colonel, if you’d let me go a
little way into the prairie.”
“Half an hour,” said Clark, “and you’ll not go alone.” Sweeping
his eye over Bowman’s company, he picked out a man here and a man
there to go with Saunders. Then his eye lighted on me. "Where’s
McChesney?” he said. "Fetch McChesney.”
I ran to get Tom, and seven of them went away, with Saunders in
the middle, Clark watching them like a hawk, while the men sat
down in the grass to wait. Fifteen minutes went by, and twenty,
and twenty-five, and Clark was calling for a rope, when some one
caught sight of the squad in the distance returning at a run. And
when they came within hail it was Saunders’ voice we heard,
shouting brokenly: —
“I’ve struck it, Colonel, I’ve struck the trace. There’s a pecan
at the edge of the bottom with my own blaze on it.”
“May you never be as near death again,” said the Colonel,
grimly, as he gave the order to march.
The fourth day passed, and we left behind us the patches of
forest and came into the open prairie, — as far as the eye could
reach a long, level sea of waving green. The scanty provisions ran
out, hunger was added to the pangs of thirst and weariness, and
here and there in the straggling file discontent smouldered and
angry undertone was heard. Kaskaskia was somewhere to the west and
north; but how far? Clark had misled them. And in addition it were
foolish to believe that the garrison had not been warned. English
soldiers and French militia and Indian allies stood ready for our
reception. Of such was the talk as we lay down in the grass under
the stars on the fifth night. For in the rank and file an empty
stomach is not hopeful.
The next morning we took up our march silently with the dawn,
the prairie grouse whirring ahead of us. At last, as afternoon
drew on, a dark line of green edged the prairie to the westward,
and our spirits rose. From mouth to mouth ran the word that these
were the woods which fringed the bluff above Kaskaskia itself. We
pressed ahead, and the destiny of the new Republic for which we
had fought made us walk unseen. Excitement keyed us high; we
reached the shade, plunged into it, and presently came out staring
at the bastioned corners of a fort which rose from the centre of a
clearing. It had once defended the place, but now stood abandoned
and dismantled. Beyond it, at the edge of the bluff, we halted,
astonished. The sun was falling in the west, and below us was the
goal for the sight of which we had suffered so much. At our feet,
across the wooded bottom, was the Kaskaskia River, and beyond, the
peaceful little French village with its low houses and orchards
and gardens colored by the touch of the evening light. In the
centre of it stood a stone church with its belfry; but our
searching eyes alighted on the spot to the southward of it, near
the river. There stood a rambling stone building with the shingles
of its roof weathered black, and all around it a palisade of
pointed sticks thrust in the ground, and with a pair of gates and
watch-towers. Drooping on its staff was the standard of England.
North and south of the village the emerald common gleamed in the
slanting light, speckled red and white and black by grazing
cattle. Here and there, in untidy brown patches, were Indian
settlements, and far away to the westward the tawny Father of
Waters gleamed through the cottonwoods.
Through the waning day the men lay resting under the trees,
talking in undertones. Some cleaned their rifles, and others lost
themselves in conjectures of the attack. But Clark himself,
tireless, stood with folded arms gazing at the scene below, and
the sunlight on his face illumined him (to the lad standing at his
side) as the servant of destiny. At length, at eventide, the
sweet-toned bell of the little cathedral rang to vespers, — a gentle
message of peace to war. Colonel Clark looked into my upturned
face.
“Davy, do you know what day this is?” he asked.
“No, sir,” I answered.
“Two years have gone since the bells pealed for the birth of a
new nation — your nation, Davy, and mine — the nation that is to be
the refuge of the oppressed of this earth — the nation which is to
be made of all peoples, out of all time. And this land for which
you and I shall fight to-night will belong to it, and the lands
beyond,” he pointed to the west, “until the sun sets on the sea
again.” He put his hand on my head. "You will remember this when I
am dead and gone,” he said.
I was silent, awed by the power of his words.
Darkness fell, and still we waited, impatient for the order. And
when at last it came the men bustled hither and thither to find
their commands, and we picked our way on the unseen road that led
down the bluff, our hearts thumping. The lights of the village
twinkled at our feet, and now and then a voice from below was
caught and borne upward to us. Once another noise startled us,
followed by an exclamation, “Donnerblitzen” and a volley of low
curses from the company. Poor Swein Poulsson had loosed a stone,
which had taken a reverberating flight riverward.
We reached the bottom, and the long file turned and hurried
silently northward, searching for a crossing. I try to recall my
feelings as I trotted beside the tall forms that loomed above me
in the night. The sense of protection they gave me stripped me of
fear, and I was not troubled with that. My thoughts were chiefly
on Polly Ann and the child we had left in the fort now so far to
the south of us, and in my fancy I saw her cheerful, ever helpful
to those around her, despite the load that must rest on her heart.
I saw her simple joy at our return. But should we return? My chest
tightened, and I sped along the ranks to Harrod’s company and
caught Tom by the wrist.
“Davy,” he murmured, and, seizing my hand in his strong grip,
pulled me along with him. For it was not given to him to say what
he felt; but as I hurried to keep pace with his stride, Polly
Ann’s words rang in my ears, “Davy, take care of my Tom,” and I
knew that he, too, was thinking of her. A hail aroused me, the
sound of a loud rapping, and I saw in black relief a cabin ahead.
The door opened, a man came out with a horde of children cowering
at his heels, a volley of frightened words pouring from his mouth
in a strange tongue. John Duff was plying him with questions in
French, and presently the man became calmer and lapsed into broken
English.
“Kaskaskia — yes, she is prepare. Many spy is gone out — cross la
rivière. But now they all sleep.”
Even as he spoke a shout came faintly from the distant town.
“What is that?” demanded Clark, sharply.
The man shrugged his shoulders.
“Une fète des nègres,
peut-être, — the negro, he dance maybe.”
“Are you the ferryman?” said Clark.
“Oui — I have some boat.”
We crossed the hundred and fifty yards of sluggish water, squad
by squad, and in the silence of the night stood gathered,
expectant, on the farther bank. Midnight was at hand. Commands
were passed about, and men ran this way and that, jostling one
another to find their places in a new order. But at length our
little force stood in three detachments on the river’s bank, their
captains repeating again and again the part which each was to
play, that none might mistake his duty. The two larger ones were
to surround the town, while the picked force under Simon Kenton
himself was to storm the fort. Should he gain it by surprise and
without battle, three shots were to be fired in quick succession,
the other detachments were to start the war-whoop, while Duff and
some with a smattering of French were to run up and down the
streets proclaiming that every habitan who left his house would be
shot. No provision being made for the drummer boy (I had left my
drum on the heights above), I chose the favored column, at the
head of which Tom and Cowan and Ray and McCann were striding
behind Kenton and Colonel Clark. Not a word was spoken. There was
a kind of cow-path that rose and fell and twisted along the
river-bank. This we followed, and in ten minutes we must have
covered the mile to the now darkened village. The starlight alone
outlined against the sky the houses of it as we climbed the bank.
Then we halted, breathless, in a street, but there was no sound
save that of the crickets and the frogs. Forward again, and
twisting a corner, we beheld the indented edge of the stockade.
Still no hail, nor had our moccasined feet betrayed us as we
sought the river side of the fort and drew up before the big river
gates of it. Simon Kenton bore against them, and tried the little
postern that was set there, but both were fast. The spikes towered
a dozen feet overhead.
“Quick!” muttered Clark, “a light man to go over and open the
postern.”
Before I guessed what was in his mind, Cowan seized me.
“Send the lad, Colonel,” said he.
“Ay, ay,” said Simon Kenton, hoarsely.
In a second Tom was on Kenton’s shoulders, and they passed me up
with as little trouble as though I had been my own drum.
Feverishly searching with my foot for Tom’s shoulder, I seized the
spikes at the top, clambered over them, paused, surveyed the empty
area below me, destitute even of a sentry, and then let myself
down with the aid of the cross-bars inside. As I was feeling
vainly for the bolt of the postern, rays of light suddenly shot my
shadow against the door. And next, as I got my hand on the
bolt-head, I felt the weight of another on my shoulder, and a
voice behind me said in English: —
“In the devil’s name!”
I gave the one frantic pull, the bolt slipped, and caught again.
Then Colonel Clark’s voice rang out in the night: —
“Open the gate! Open the gate in the name of Virginia and the
Continental Congress!”
Before I could cry out the man gave a grunt, leaned his gun
against the gate, and tore my fingers from the bolt-handle.
Astonishment robbed me of breath as he threw open the postern.
“In the name of the Continental Congress,” he cried, and seized
his gun. Clark and Kenton stepped in instantly, no doubt as
astounded as I, and had the man in their grasp.
“Who are you?” said Clark.
“Name o’ Skene, from Pennsylvanya,” said the man, “and by the
Lord God ye shall have the fort.”
“You looked for us?” said Clark.
“Faith, never less,” said the Pennsylvanian. "The one sentry is
at the main gate.”
“And the governor?”
“Rocheblave?” said the Pennsylvanian. "He sleeps yonder in the
old Jesuit house in the middle.”
Clark turned to Tom McChesney, who was at his elbow.
“Corporal!” said he, swiftly, “secure the sentry at the main
gate! You,” he added, turning to the Pennsylvanian, “lead us to
the governor. But mind, if you betray me, I’ll be the first to
blow out your brains.”
The man seized a lantern and made swiftly over the level ground
until the rubble-work of the old Jesuit house showed in the light,
nor Clark nor any of them stopped to think of the danger our
little handful ran at the mercy of a stranger. The house was
silent. We halted, and Clark threw himself against the rude panels
of the door, which gave to inward blackness. Our men filled the
little passage, and suddenly we found ourselves in a low-ceiled
room in front of a great four-poster bed. And in it, upright,
blinking at the light, were two odd Frenchified figures in
tasselled nightcaps. Astonishment and anger and fear struggled in
the faces of Monsieur de Rocheblave and his lady. A regard for
truth compels me to admit that it was madame who first found her
voice, and no uncertain one it was.
First came a shriek that might have roused the garrison.
“Villains! Murderers! Outragers of decency!” she cried with
spirit, pouring a heap of invectives, now in French, now in
English, much to the discomfiture of our backwoodsmen, who peered
at her helplessly.
“Nom du diable!” cried the commandant, when his lady’s breath
was gone, “what does this mean?”
“It means, sir,” answered Clark, promptly, “that you are my
prisoner.”
“And who are you?” gasped the commandant.
“George Rogers Clark, Colonel in the service of the Commonwealth
of Virginia.” He held out his hand restrainingly, for the furious
Monsieur Rocheblave made an attempt to rise. "You will oblige me
by remaining in bed, sir, for a moment.”
“Coquins! Canailles! Cochons!” shrieked the lady.
“Madame,” said Colonel Clark, politely, “the necessities of war
are often cruel.”
He made a bow, and paying no further attention to the torrent of
her reproaches or the threats of the helpless commandant, he
calmly searched the room with the lantern, and finally pulled out
from under the bed a metal despatch box. Then he lighted a candle
in a brass candlestick that stood on the simple walnut dresser,
and bowed again to the outraged couple in the four-poster.
“Now, sir,” he said, “you may dress. We will retire.”
“Pardieu!” said the commandant in French, “a hundred thousand
thanks.”
We had scarcely closed the bedroom door when three shots were
heard.
“The signal!” exclaimed Clark.
Immediately a pandemonium broke on the silence of the night that
must have struck cold terror in the hearts of the poor Creoles
sleeping in their beds. The war-whoop, the scalp halloo in the
dead of the morning, with the hideous winding notes of them that
reached the bluff beyond and echoed back, were enough to frighten
a man from his senses. In the intervals, in backwoods French, John
Duff and his companions were heard in terrifying tones crying out
to the habitans to venture out at the peril of their lives.
Within the fort a score of lights flew up and down like
will-o’-the-wisps, and Colonel Clark, standing on the steps of the
governor’s house, gave out his orders and despatched his
messengers. Me he sent speeding through the village to tell
Captain Bowman to patrol the outskirts of the town, that no runner
might get through to warn Fort Chartres and Cohos, as some called
Cahokia. None stirred save the few Indians left in the place, and
these were brought before Clark in the fort, sullen and defiant,
and put in the guard-house there. And Rocheblave, when he
appeared, was no better, and was put back in his house under
guard.
As for the papers in the despatch box, they revealed I know not
what briberies of the savage nations and plans of the English. But
of other papers we found none, though there must have been more.
Madame Rocheblave was suspected of having hidden some in the
inviolable portions of her dress.
At length the cocks crowing for day proclaimed the morning, and
while yet the blue shadow of the bluff was on the town, Colonel
Clark sallied out of the gate and walked abroad. Strange it seemed
that war had come to this village, so peaceful and remote. And
even stranger it seemed to me to see these Arcadian homes in the
midst of the fierce wilderness. The little houses with their
sloping roofs and wide porches, the gardens ablaze with color, the
neat palings, — all were a restful sight for our weary eyes. And now
I scarcely knew our commander. For we had not gone far ere,
timidly, a door opened and a mild-visaged man, in the simple
workaday smock that the French wore, stood, hesitating, on the
steps. The odd thing was that he should have bowed to Clark, who
was dressed no differently from Bowman and Harrod and Duff; and
the man’s voice trembled piteously as he spoke. It needed not John
Duff to tell us that he was pleading for the lives of his family.
“He will sell himself as a slave if your Excellency will spare
them,” said Duff, translating.
But Clark stared at the man sternly.
“I will tell them my plans at the proper time,” he said and when
Duff had translated this the man turned and went silently into his
house again, closing the door behind him. And before we had
traversed the village the same thing had happened many times. We
gained the fort again, I wondering greatly why he had not
reassured these simple people. It was Bowman who asked this
question, he being closer to Clark than any of the other captains.
Clark said nothing then, and began to give out directions for the
day. But presently he called the Captain aside.
“Bowman,” I heard him say, “we have one hundred and fifty men to
hold a province bigger than the whole of France, and filled with
treacherous tribes in the King’s pay. I must work out the problem
for myself.”
Bowman was silent. Clark, with that touch which made men love
him and die for him, laid his hand on the Captain’s shoulder.
“Have the men called in by detachments,” he said, “and fed. God
knows they must be hungry, — and you.”
Suddenly I remembered that he himself had had nothing. Running
around the commandant’s house to the kitchen door, I came
unexpectedly upon Swein Poulsson, who was face to face with the
linsey-woolsey-clad figure of Monsieur Rocheblave’s negro cook.
The early sun cast long shadows of them on the ground.
“By tam,” my friend was saying, “so I vill eat. I am choost like
an ox for three days, und chew grass. Prairie grass, is it?”
“Mo pas capab’, Michié,” said the cook, with a terrified roll of
his white eyes.
“Herr Gott!” cried Swein Poulsson, “I am red face. Aber Herr
Gott, I thank thee I am not a nigger. Und my hair is bristles,
yes. Davy" (spying me), “I thank Herr Gott it is not vool. Let us
in the kitchen go.”
“I am come to get something for the Colonel’s breakfast,” said
I, pushing past the slave, through the open doorway. Swein
Poulsson followed, and here I struck another contradiction in his
strange nature. He helped me light the fire in the great stone
chimney-place, and we soon had a pot of hominy on the crane, and
turning on the spit a piece of buffalo steak which we found in the
larder. Nor did a mouthful pass his lips until I had sped away
with a steaming portion to find the Colonel. By this time the men
had broken into the storehouse, and the open place was dotted with
their breakfast fires. Clark was standing alone by the flagstaff,
his face careworn. But he smiled as he saw me coming.
“What’s this?” says he.
“Your breakfast, sir,” I answered. I set down the plate and the
pot before him and pressed the pewter spoon into his hand.
“Davy,” said he.
“Sir?” said I.
“What did you have for your breakfast?”
My lip trembled, for I was very hungry, and the rich steam from
the hominy was as much as I could stand. Then the Colonel took me
by the arms, as gently as a woman might, set me down on the ground
beside him, and taking a spoonful of the hominy forced it between
my lips. I was near to fainting at the taste of it. Then he took a
bit himself, and divided the buffalo steak with his own hands. And
when from the camp-fires they perceived the Colonel and the
drummer boy eating together in plain sight of all, they gave a
rousing cheer.
“Swein Poulsson helped get your breakfast, sir, and would eat
nothing either,” I ventured.
“Davy,” said Colonel Clark, gravely, “I hope you will be younger
when you are twenty.”
“I hope I shall be bigger, sir,” I answered gravely.
CHAPTER XIV.
how the kaskaskeians were made citizens
NEVER before had such a day dawned upon Kaskaskia. With July
fierceness the sun beat down upon the village, but man nor woman
nor child stirred from the darkened houses. What they awaited at
the hands of the Long Knives they knew not, — captivity, torture,
death perhaps. Through the deserted streets stalked a squad of
backwoodsmen headed by John Duff and two American traders found in
the town, who were bestirring themselves in our behalf, knocking
now at this door and anon at that.
“The Colonel bids you come to the fort,” he said, and was gone.
The church bell rang with slow, ominous strokes, far different
from its gentle vesper peal of yesterday. Two companies were drawn
up in the sun before the old Jesuit house, and presently through
the gate a procession came, grave and mournful. The tone of it was
sombre in the white glare, for men had donned their best (as they
thought) for the last time, — cloth of camlet and Cadiz and
Limbourg, white cotton stockings, and brass-buckled shoes. They
came like captives led to execution. But at their head a figure
held our eye, — a figure that spoke of dignity and courage, of
trials borne for others. It was the village priest in his robes.
He had a receding forehead and a strong, pointed chin; but
benevolence was in the curve of his great nose. I have many times
since seen his type of face in the French prints. He and his flock
halted before our young Colonel, even as the citizens of Calais in
a bygone century must have stood before the English king.
The scene comes back to me. On the one side, not the warriors of
a nation that has made its mark in war, but peaceful peasants who
had sought this place for its remoteness from persecution, to live
and die in harmony with all mankind. On the other, the sinewy
advance guard of a race that knows not peace, whose goddess of
liberty carries in her hand a sword. The plough might have been
graven on our arms, but always the rifle.
The silence of the trackless wilds reigned while Clark gazed at
them sternly. And when he spoke it was with the voice of a
conqueror, and they listened as the conquered listen, with heads
bowed — all save the priest.
Clark told them first that they had been given a false and a
wicked notion of the American cause, and he spoke of the tyranny
of the English king, which had become past endurance to a free
people. As for ourselves, the Long Knives, we came in truth to
conquer, and because of their hasty judgment the Kaskaskians were
at our mercy. The British had told them that the Kentuckians were
a barbarous people, and they had believed.
He paused that John Duff might translate and the gist of what he
had said sink in. But suddenly the priest had stepped out from the
ranks, faced his people, and was himself translating in a strong
voice. When he had finished a tremor shook the group. But he
turned calmly and faced Clark once more.
“Citizens of Kaskaskia,” Colonel Clark went on, “the king whom
you renounced when the English conquered you, the great King of
France, has judged for you and the French people. Knowing that the
American cause is just, he is sending his fleets and regiments to
fight for it against the British King, who until now has been your
sovereign.”
Again he paused, and when the priest had told them this, a
murmur of astonishment came from the boldest.
“Citizens of Kaskaskia, know you that the Long Knives come not
to massacre, as you foolishly believed, but to release from
bondage. We are come not against you, who have been deceived, but
against those soldiers of the British King who have bribed the
savages to slaughter our wives and children. You have but to take
the oath of allegiance to the Continental Congress to become free,
even as we are, to enjoy the blessings of that American government
under which we live and for which we fight.”
The face of the good priest kindled as he glanced at Clark. He
turned once more, and though we could not understand his words,
the thrill of his eloquence moved us. And when he had finished
there was a moment’s hush of inarticulate joy among his flock, and
then such transports as moved strangely the sternest men in our
ranks. The simple people fell to embracing each other and praising
God, the tears running on their cheeks. Out of the group came an
old man. A skullcap rested on his silvered hair, and he felt the
ground uncertainly with his gold-headed stick.
“Monsieur,” he said tremulously "you will pardon an old man if
he show feeling. I am born seventy year ago in Gascon. I inhabit
this country thirty year, and last night I think I not live any
longer. Last night we make our peace with the good God, and come
here to-day to die. But we know you not,” he cried, with a sudden
and surprising vigor; "ha, we know you not! They told us lies, and
we were humble and believed. But now we are Américains,” he cried,
his voice pitched high, as he pointed with a trembling arm to the
stars and stripes above him. “Mes enfants, vive les Bostonnais!
Vive les Américains! Vive Monsieur le Colonel Clark, sauveur de
Kaskaskia!”
The listening village heard the shout and wondered. And when it
had died down Colonel Clark took the old Gascon by the hand, and
not a man of his but saw that this was a master-stroke of his
genius.
“My friends,” he said simply, “I thank you. I would not force
you, and you will have some days to think over the oath of
allegiance to the Republic. Go now to your homes, and tell those
who are awaiting you what I have said. And if any man of French
birth wish to leave this place, he may go of his own free will,
save only three whom I suspect are not our friends.”
They turned, and in an ecstasy of joy quite pitiful to see went
trooping out of the gate. But scarce could they have reached the
street and we have broken ranks, when we saw them coming back
again, the priest leading them as before. They drew near to the
spot where Clark stood, talking to the captains, and halted
expectantly.
“What is it, my friends?” asked the Colonel.
The priest came forward and bowed gravely.
“I am Pere Gibault, sir,” he said, “cure of Kaskaskia.” He
paused, surveying our commander with a clear eye. "There is
something that still troubles the good citizens.”
“And what is that, sir?” said Clark.
The priest hesitated.
“If your Excellency will only allow the church to be opened — " he
ventured.
The group stood wistful, fearful that their boldness had
displeased, expectant of reprimand.
“My good Father,” said Colonel Clark, “an American commander has
but one relation to any church. And that is" (he added with force)
"to protect it. For all religions are equal before the Republic.”
The priest gazed at him intently.
“By that answer,” said he, “your Excellency has made for your
government loyal citizens in Kaskaskia.”
Then the Colonel stepped up to the priest and took him likewise
by the hand.
“I have arranged for a house in town,” said he. "Monsieur
Rocheblave has refused to dine with me there. Will you do me that
honor, Father?”
“With all my heart, your Excellency,” said Father Gibault. And
turning to the people, he translated what the Colonel had said.
Then their cup of happiness was indeed full, and some ran to Clark
and would have thrown their arms about him had he been a man to
embrace. Hurrying out of the gate, they spread the news like
wildfire, and presently the church bell clanged in tones of
unmistakable joy.
“Sure, Davy dear, it puts me in mind of the Saints’ day at
home,” said Terence, as he stood leaning against a picket fence
that bordered the street, “savin’ the presence of the naygurs and
thim red divils wid blankets an’ scowls as wud turrn the milk sour
in the pail.”
He had stopped beside two Kaskaskia warriors in scarlet blankets
who stood at the corner, watching with silent contempt the antics
of the French inhabitants. Now and again one or the other gave a
grunt and wrapped his blanket more tightly about him.
“Umrrhh!” said Terence. "Faith, I talk that langwidge mesilf
when I have throuble.” The warriors stared at him with what might
be called a stoical surprise. "Umrrh! Does the holy father praych
to ye wid thim wurrds, ye haythens? Begorra, ’tis a wondher ye
wuddent wash yereselves,” he added, making a face, “wid muddy
wather to be had for the askin’.”
We moved on, through such a scene as I have seldom beheld. The
village had donned its best: women in cap and gown were hurrying
hither and thither, some laughing and some weeping; grown men
embraced each other; children of all colors flung themselves
against Terence’s legs, — dark-haired Creoles, little negroes with
woolly pates, and naked Indian lads with bow and arrow. Terence
dashed at them now and then, and they fled screaming into
dooryards to come out again and mimic him when he had passed,
while mothers and fathers and grandfathers smiled at the good
nature in his Irish face. Presently he looked down at me
comically.
“Why wuddent ye be doin’ the like, Davy?” he asked. "Amusha!
’tis mesilf that wants to run and hop and skip wid the childher.
Ye put me in mind of a wizened old man that sat all day makin’
shoes in Killarney, — all savin’ the fringe he had on his chin.”
“A soldier must be dignified,” I answered.
“The saints bar that wurrd from hiven,” said Terence, trying to
pronounce it. "Come, we’ll go to mass, or me mother will be
visitin’ me this night.”
We crossed the square and went into the darkened church, where
the candles were burning. It was the first church I had ever
entered, and I heard with awe the voice of the priest and the
fervent responses, but I understood not a word of what was said.
Afterwards Father Gibault mounted to the pulpit and stood for a
moment with his hand raised above his flock, and then began to
speak. What he told them I have learned since. And this I know,
that when they came out again into the sunlit square they were
Americans. It matters not when they took the oath.
As we walked back towards the fort we came to a little house
with a flower garden in front of it, and there stood Colonel Clark
himself by the gate. He stopped us with a motion of his hand.
“Davy,” said he, “we are to live here for a while, you and I.
What do you think of our headquarters?” He did not wait for me to
reply, but continued, “Can you suggest any improvement?”
“You will be needing a soldier to be on guard in front, sir,”
said I.
“Ah,” said the Colonel, “McChesney is too valuable a man. I am
sending him with Captain Bowman to take Cahokia.”
“Would you have Terence, sir?” I ventured, while Terence
grinned. Whereupon Colonel Clark sent him to report to his captain
that he was detailed for orderly duty to the commanding officer.
And within half an hour he was standing guard in the flower
garden, making grimaces at the children in the street. Colonel
Clark sat at a table in the little front room, and while two of
Monsieur Rocheblave’s negroes cooked his dinner, he was busy with
a score of visitors, organizing, advising, planning, and
commanding. There were disputes to settle now that alarm had
subsided, and at noon three excitable gentlemen came in to inform
against a certain Monsieur Cerre, merchant and trader, then absent
at St. Louis. When at length the Colonel had succeeded in bringing
their denunciations to an end and they had departed, he looked at
me comically as I stood in the doorway.
“Davy,” said he, “all I ask of the good Lord is that He will
frighten me incontinently for a month before I die.”
“I think He would find that difficult, sir,” I answered.
“Then there’s no hope for me,” he answered, laughing, “for I
have observed that fright alone brings a man into a fit spiritual
state to enter heaven. What would you say of those slanderers of
Monsieur Cerre?”
Not expecting an answer, he dipped his quill into the ink-pot
and turned to his papers.
“I should say that they owed Monsieur Cerre money,” I replied.
The Colonel dropped his quill and stared. As for me, I was
puzzled to know why.
“Egad,” said Colonel Clark, “most of us get by hard knocks what
you seem to have been born with.” He fell to musing, a worried
look coming on his face that was no stranger to me later, and his
hand fell heavily on the loose pile of paper before him. "Davy,”
says he, “I need a commissary-general.”
“What would that be, sir,” I asked.
“A John Law, who will make something out of nothing, who will
make money out of this blank paper, who will wheedle the Creole
traders into believing they are doing us a favor and making their
everlasting fortune by advancing us flour and bacon.”
“And doesn’t Congress make money, sir?” I asked.
“That they do, Davy, by the ton,” he replied, “and so must we,
as the rulers of a great province. For mark me, though the men are
happy to-day, in four days they will be grumbling and trying to
desert in dozens.”
We were interrupted by a knock at the door, and there stood
Terence McCann.
“His riverence!” he announced, and bowed low as the priest came
into the room.
I was bid by Colonel Clark to sit down and dine with them on the
good things which Monsieur Rocheblave’s cook had prepared. After
dinner they went into the little orchard behind the house and sat
drinking (in the French fashion) the commandant’s precious coffee
which had been sent to him from far-away New Orleans. Colonel
Clark plied the priest with questions of the French towns under
English rule: and Father Gibault, speaking for his simple people,
said that the English had led them easily to believe that the
Kentuckians were cutthroats.
“Ah, monsieur,” he said, “if they but knew you! If they but knew
the principles of that government for which you fight, they would
renounce the English allegiance, and the whole of this territory
would be yours. I know them, from Quebec to Detroit and
Michilimackinac and Saint Vincennes. Listen, monsieur,” he cried,
his homely face alight; "I myself will go to Saint Vincennes for
you. I will tell them the truth, and you shall have the post for
the asking.”
“You will go to Vincennes!” exclaimed Clark; "a hard and
dangerous journey of a hundred leagues!”
“Monsieur,” answered the priest, simply, “the journey is
nothing. For a century the missionaries of the Church have walked
this wilderness alone with God. Often they have suffered, and
often died in tortures — but gladly.”
Colonel Clark regarded the man intently.
“The cause of liberty, both religious and civil, is our cause,”
Father Gibault continued. "Men have died for it, and will die for
it, and it will prosper. Furthermore, Monsieur, my life has not
known many wants. I have saved something to keep my old age, with
which to buy a little house and an orchard in this peaceful place.
The sum I have is at your service. The good Congress will repay
me. And you need the money.”
Colonel Clark was not an impulsive man, but he felt none the
less deeply, as I know well. His reply to this generous offer was
almost brusque, but it did not deceive the priest.
“Nay, monsieur,” he said, “it is for mankind I give it, in
remembrance of Him who gave everything. And though I receive
nothing in return, I shall have my reward an hundred fold.”
In due time, I know not how, the talk swung round again to
lightness, for the Colonel loved a good story, and the priest had
many which he told with wit in his quaint French accent. As he was
rising to take his leave, Pere Gibault put his hand on my head.
“I saw your Excellency’s son in the church this morning,” he
said.
Colonel Clark laughed and gave me a pinch.
“My dear sir,” he said, “the boy is old enough to be my father.”
The priest looked down at me with a puzzled expression in his
brown eyes.
“I would I had him for my son,” said Colonel Clark, kindly; "but
the lad is eleven, and I shall not be twenty-six until next
November.”
“Your Excellency not twenty-six!” cried Father Gibault, in
astonishment. "What will you be when you are thirty?”
The young Colonel’s face clouded.
“God knows!” he said.
Father Gibault dropped his eyes and turned to me with native
tact.
“What would you like best to do, my son?” he asked.
“I should like to learn to speak French,” said I, for I had been
much irritated at not understanding what was said in the streets.
“And so you shall,” said Father Gibault; "I myself will teach
you. You must come to my house to-day.”
“And Davy will teach me,” said the Colonel.
BUT I was not immediately to take up the study of French. Things began
to happen in Kaskaskia. In the first place, Captain Bowman’s company,
with a few scouts, of which Tom was one, set out that very afternoon for
the capture of Cohos, or Cahokia, and this despite the fact that they
had had no sleep for two nights. If you will look at the map, you
will see, dotted along the bottoms and the bluffs beside the great
Mississippi, the string of villages, Kaskaskia, La Prairie du Rocher,
Fort Chartres, St. Philip, and Cahokia. Some few miles from Cahokia, on
the western bank of the Father of Waters, was the little French village
of St. Louis, in the Spanish territory of Louisiana. From thence
eastward stretched the great waste of prairie and forest inhabited by
roving bands of the forty Indian nations. Then you come to Vincennes on
the Wabash, Fort St. Vincent, the English and Canadians called it, for
there were a few of the latter who had settled in Kaskaskia since the
English occupation.
Map
of the Mississippi River.
Lieutenant
Ross, 1772.
We gathered on the western skirts of the village to give
Bowman’s company a cheer, and every man, woman, and child in the
place watched the little column as it wound snakelike over the
prairie on the road to Fort Chartres, until it was lost in the
cottonwoods to the westward.
Things began to happen in Kaskaskia. It would have been strange
indeed if things had not happened. One hundred and seventy-five
men had marched into that territory out of which now are carved
the great states of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, and to most of
them the thing was a picnic, a jaunt which would soon be finished.
Many had left families in the frontier forts without protection.
The time of their enlistment had almost expired.
There was a store in the village kept by a great citizen, — not a
citizen of Kaskaskia alone, but a citizen of the world. This, I am
aware, sounds like fiction, like an attempt to get an effect which
was not there. But it is true as gospel. The owner of this store
had many others scattered about in this foreign country: at
Vincennes, at St. Louis, where he resided, at Cahokia. He knew
Michilimackinac and Quebec and New Orleans. He had been born some
thirty-one years before in Sardinia, had served in the Spanish
army, and was still a Spanish subject. The name of this famous
gentleman was Monsieur Francois Vigo, and he was the Rothschild of
the country north of the Ohio. Monsieur Vigo, though he merited
it, I had not room to mention in the last chapter. Clark had
routed him from his bed on the morning of our arrival, and whether
or not he had been in the secret of frightening the inhabitants
into making their wills, and then throwing them into transports of
joy, I know not.
Monsieur Vigo’s store was the village club. It had neither glass
in the window nor an attractive display of goods; it was merely a
log cabin set down on a weedy, sun-baked plot. The stuffy smell of
skins and furs came out of the doorway. Within, when he was in
Kaskaskia, Monsieur Vigo was wont to sit behind his rough walnut
table, writing with a fine quill, or dispensing the news of the
villages to the priest and other prominent citizens, or haggling
with persistent blanketed braves over canoe-loads of ill-smelling
pelts which they brought down from the green forests of the north.
Monsieur Vigo’s clothes were the color of the tobacco he gave in
exchange; his eyes were not unlike the black beads he traded, but
shrewd and kindly withal, set in a square saffron face that had
the contradiction of a small chin. As the days wore into months,
Monsieur Vigo’s place very naturally became the headquarters for
our army, if army it might be called. Of a morning a dozen would
be sitting against the logs in the black shadow, and in the midst
of them always squatted an unsavory Indian squaw. A few braves
usually stood like statues at the corner, and in front of the door
another group of hunting shirts. Without was the paper money of
the Continental Congress, within the good tafia and tobacco of
Monsieur Vigo. One day Monsieur Vigo’s young Creole clerk stood
shrugging his shoulders in the doorway. I stopped.
“By tam!” Swein Poulsson was crying to the clerk, as he waved a
worthless scrip above his head. "Vat is money?”
This definition the clerk, not being a Doctor Johnson, was
unable to give offhand.
“Vat are you, choost? Is it America?” demanded Poulsson, while
the others looked on, some laughing, some serious. "And vich
citizen are you since you are ours? You vill please to give me one
carrot of tobacco.” And he thrust the scrip under the clerk’s
nose.
The clerk stared at the uneven lettering on the scrip with
disdain.
“Money,” he exclaimed scornfully, “she is not money.
Piastre — Spanish dollare — then I give you carrot.”
“By God!” shouted Bill Cowan, “ye will take Virginny paper, and
Congress paper, or else I reckon we’ll have a drink and tobacey,
boys, take or no take.”
“Hooray, Bill, ye’re right,” cried several of our men.
“Lemme in here,” said Cowan. But the frightened Creole blocked
the doorway.
“Sacré!” he screamed, and then, “Voleurs!”
The excitement drew a number of people from the neighborhood.
Nay, it seemed as if the whole town was ringed about us.
“Bravo, Jules!” they cried, “garde-tu la porte.
À bas les
Bostonnais! À bas les voleurs!”
“Damn such monkey talk,” said Cowan, facing them suddenly. I
knew him well, and when the giant lost his temper it was gone
irrevocably until a fight was over. "Call a man a squar’ name.”
“Hey, Frenchy,” another of our men put in, stalking up to the
clerk, “I reckon this here store’s ourn, ef we’ve a mind to tek
it. I ’low you’ll give us the rum and the ’bacey. Come on, boys!”
In between him and the clerk leaped a little, robin-like man
with a red waistcoat, beside himself with rage. Bill Cowan and his
friends stared at this diminutive Frenchman, open-mouthed, as he
poured forth a veritable torrent of unintelligible words,
plentifully mixed with sacres, which he ripped out like snarls. I
would as soon have touched him as a ball of angry bees or a pair
of fighting wildcats. Not so Bill Cowan. When that worthy
recovered from his first surprise he seized hold of some of the
man’s twisting arms and legs and lifted him bodily from the
ground, as he would have taken a perverse and struggling child.
There was no question of a fight. Cowan picked him up, I say, and
before any one knew what happened, he flung him on to the hot roof
of the store (the eaves were but two feet above his head), and
there the man stuck, clinging to a loose shingle, purpling and
coughing and spitting with rage. There was a loud gust of guffaws
from the woodsmen, and oaths like whip-cracks from the circle
around us, menacing growls as it surged inward and our men turned
to face it. A few citizens pushed through the outskirts of it and
ran away, and in the hush that followed we heard them calling
wildly the names of Father Gibault and Clark and of Vigo himself.
Cowan thrust me past the clerk into the store, where I stood
listening to the little man on the roof, scratching and clutching
at the shingles, and coughing still.
But there was no fight. Shouts of “Monsieur Vigo! Voici Monsieur
Vigo!” were heard, the crowd parted respectfully, and Monsieur
Vigo in his snuff-colored suit stood glancing from Cowan to his
pallid clerk. He was not in the least excited.
“Come in, my frens,” he said; "it is too hot in the sun.” And he
set the example by stepping over the sill on to the hard-baked
earth of the floor within. Then he spied me. "Ah,” he said, “the
boy of Monsieur le Colonel! And how are you called, my son?” he
added, patting me kindly.
“Davy, sir,” I answered.
“Ha,” he said, “and a brave soldier, no doubt.”
I was flattered as well as astonished by this attention. But
Monsieur Vigo knew men, and he had given them time to turn around.
By this time Bill Cowan and some of my friends had stooped through
the doorway, followed by a prying Kaskaskian brave and as many
Creoles as could crowd behind them. Monsieur Vigo was surprisingly
calm.
“It make hot weather, my frens,” said he. "How can I serve you,
messieurs?”
“Hain’t the Congress got authority here?” said one.
“I am happy to say,” answered Monsieur Vigo, rubbing his hands,
"for I think much of your principle.”
“Then,” said the man, “we come here to trade with Congress
money. Hain’t that money good in Kaskasky?”
There was an anxious pause. Then Monsieur Vigo’s eyes twinkled,
and he looked at me.
“And what you say, Davy?” he asked.
“The money would be good if you took it, sir,” I said, not
knowing what else to answer.
“Sapristi!” exclaimed Monsieur Vigo, looking hard at me. "Who
teach you that?”
“No one, sir,” said I, staring in my turn.
“And if Congress lose, and not pay, where am I, mon petit maître
de la haute finance?” demanded Monsieur Vigo, with the palms of
his hands outward.
“You will be in good company, sir,” said I.
At that he threw back his head and laughed, and Bill Cowan and
my friends laughed with him.
“Good company — c’est la plupart de la vie,” said Monsieur Vigo.
“Et quel garçon — what a boy it is!”
“I never seed his beat fer wisdom, Mister Vigo,” said Bill
Cowan, now in good humor once more at the prospect of rum and
tobacco. And I found out later that he and the others had actually
given to me the credit of this coup. "He never failed us yet.
Hain’t that truth, boys? Hain’t we a-goin’ on to St. Vincent
because he seen the Ha’r Buyer sculped on the Ohio?”
The rest assented so heartily but withal so gravely, that I am
between laughter and tears over the remembrance of it.
“At noon you come back,” said Monsieur Vigo. "I think till then
about rate of exchange, and talk with your Colonel. Davy, you stay
here.”
I remained, while the others filed out, and at length I was
alone with him and Jules, his clerk.
“Davy, how you like to be trader?” asked Monsieur Vigo.
It was a new thought to me, and I turned it over in my mind. To
see the strange places of the world, and the stranger people; to
become a man of wealth and influence such as Monsieur Vigo; and (I
fear I loved it best) to match my brains with others at a
bargain, — I turned it all over slowly, gravely, in my boyish mind,
rubbing the hard dirt on the floor with the toe of my moccasin.
And suddenly the thought came to me that I was a traitor to my
friends, a deserter from the little army that loved me so well.
“Eh bien?” said Monsieur Vigo.
I shook my head, but in spite of me I felt the tears welling
into my eyes and brushed them away shamefully. At such times of
stress some of my paternal Scotch crept into my speech.
“I will no be leaving Colonel Clark and the boys,” I cried, “not
for all the money in the world.”
“Congress money?” said Monsieur Vigo, with a queer expression.
It was then I laughed through my tears, and that cemented the
friendship between us. It was a lifelong friendship, though I
little suspected it then.
In the days that followed he never met me on the street that he
did not stop to pass the time of day, and ask me if I had changed
my mind. He came every morning to headquarters, where he and
Colonel Clark sat by the hour with brows knit. Monsieur Vigo was
as good as his word, and took the Congress money, though not at
such a value as many would have had him. I have often thought that
we were all children then, and knew nothing of the ingratitude of
republics. Monsieur Vigo took the money, and was all his life
many, many thousand dollars the poorer. Father Gibault advanced
his little store, and lived to feel the pangs of want. And Colonel
Clark? But I must not go beyond the troubles of that summer, and
the problems that vexed our commander. One night I missed him from
the room where we slept, and walking into the orchard found him
pacing there, where the moon cast filmy shadows on the grass. By
day as he went around among the men his brow was unclouded, though
his face was stern. But now I surprised the man so strangely moved
that I yearned to comfort him. He had taken three turns before he
perceived me.
“Davy,” he said, “what are you doing here?”
“I missed you, sir,” I answered, staring at the furrows in his
face.
“Come!” he said almost roughly, and seizing my hand, led me back
and forth swiftly through the wet grass for I know not how long.
The moon dipped to the uneven line of the ridge-pole and slipped
behind the stone chimney. All at once he stopped, dropped my hand,
and smote both of his together.
“I WILL hold on, by the eternal!” he cried. "I will let no
American read his history and say that I abandoned this land. Let
them desert! If ten men be found who will stay, I will hold the
place for the Republic.”
“Will not Virginia and the Congress send you men, sir?” I asked
wonderingly.
He laughed a laugh that was all bitterness.
“Virginia and the Continental Congress know little and care less
about me,” he answered. "Some day you will learn that foresight
sometimes comes to men, but never to assemblies. But it is often
given to one man to work out the salvation of a people, and be
destroyed for it. Davy, we have been up too long.”
At the morning parade, from my wonted place at the end of the
line, I watched him with astonishment, reviewing the troops as
usual. For the very first day I had crossed the river with
Terence, climbed the heights to the old fort, and returned with my
drum. But no sooner had I beaten the retreat than the men gathered
here and there in groups that smouldered with mutiny, and I noted
that some of the officers were amongst these. Once in a while a
sentence like a flaming brand was flung out. Their time was up,
their wives and children for all they knew sculped by the red
varmints, and, by the etarnal, Clark or no man living could keep
them.
“Hi,” said one, as I passed, “here’s Davy with his drum. He’ll
be leadin’ us back to Kaintuck in the morning.”
“Ay, ay,” cried another man in the group, “I reckon he’s had his
full of tyranny, too.”
I stopped, my face blazing red.
“Shame on you for those words!” I shouted shrilly. "Shame on
you, you fools, to desert the man who would save your wives and
children. How are the redskins to be beaten if they are not cowed
in their own country?” For I had learned much at headquarters.
They stood silent, astonished, no doubt, at the sight of my
small figure a-tremble with anger. I heard Bill Cowan’s voice
behind me.
“There’s truth for ye,” he said, “that will slink home when a
thing’s half done.”
“Ye needn’t talk, Bill Cowan; it’s well enough for ye. I reckon
your wife’d scare any redskin off her clearin’.”
“Many the time she scart me,” said Bill Cowan.
And so the matter went by with a laugh. But the grumbling
continued, and the danger was that the French would learn of it.
The day passed, yet the embers blazed not into the flame of open
mutiny. But he who has seen service knows how ominous is the
gathering of men here and there, the low humming talk, the silence
when a dissenter passes. There were fights, too, that had to be
quelled by company captains, and no man knew when the loud quarrel
between the two races at Vigo’s store would grow into an ugly
battle.
What did Clark intend to do? This was the question that hung in
the minds of mutineer and faithful alike. They knew the
desperation of his case. Without money, save that which the
generous Creoles had advanced upon his personal credit; without
apparent resources; without authority, save that which the weight
of his character exerted, — how could he prevent desertion? They
eyed him as he went from place to place about his business, — erect,
thoughtful, undisturbed. Few men dare to set their will against a
multitude when there are no fruits to be won. Columbus persisted,
and found a new world; Clark persisted, and won an empire for
thoughtless generations to enjoy.
That night he slept not at all, but sat, while the candles
flickered in their sockets, poring over maps and papers. I dared
not disturb him, but lay the darkness through with staring eyes.
And when the windows on the orchard side showed a gray square of
light, he flung down the parchment he was reading on the table. It
rolled up of itself, and he pushed back his chair. I heard him
call my name, and leaping out of bed, I stood before him.
“You sleep lightly, Davy,” he said, I think to try me.
I did not answer, fearing to tell him that I had been awake
watching him.
“I have one friend, at least,” said the Colonel.
“You have many, sir,” I answered, “as you will find when the
time comes.”
“The time has come,” said he; "to-day I shall be able to count
them. Davy, I want you to do something for me.”
“Now, sir?” I answered, overjoyed.
“As soon as the sun strikes that orchard,” he said, pointing out
of the window. "You have learned how to keep things to yourself.
Now I want you to impart them to others. Go out, and tell the
village that I am going away.”
“That you are going away, sir?” I repeated.
“That I am going away,” he said, “with my army, (save the
mark!), with my army and my drummer boy and my paper money. Such
is my faith in the loyalty of the good people of these villages to
the American cause, that I can safely leave the flag flying over
their heads with the assurance that they will protect it.”
I stared at him doubtfully, for at times a pleasantry came out
of his bitterness.
“Ay,” he said, “go! Have you any love for me?”
“I have, sir,” I answered.
“By the Lord, I believe you,” he said, and picking up my small
hunting shirt, he flung it at me. "Put it on, and go when the sun
rises.”
As the first shaft of light over the bluff revealed the diamonds
in the orchard grass I went out, wondering. SUSPECTING would be a
better word for the nature I had inherited. But I had my orders.
Terence was pacing the garden, his leggings turned black with the
dew. I looked at him. Here was a vessel to disseminate.
“Terence, the Colonel is going back to Virginia with the army.”
“Him!” cried Terence, dropping the stock of his Deckard to the
ground. "And back to Kaintuckee! Arrah, ’tis a sin to be jokin’
before a man has a bit in his sthummick. Bad cess to yere
plisantry before breakfast.”
“I’m telling you what the Colonel himself told me,” I answered,
and ran on. "Davy, darlin’!” I heard him calling after me as I
turned the corner, but I looked not back.
There was a single sound in the street. A thin, bronzed Indian
lad squatted against the pickets with his fingers on a reed, his
cheeks distended. He broke off with a wild, mournful note to stare
at me. A wisp of smoke stole from a stone chimney, and the smell
that corn-pone and bacon leave was in the air. A bolt was slammed
back, a door creaked and stuck, was flung open, and with a "Va
t’en, mechant!” a cotton-clad urchin was cast out of the house,
and fled into the dusty street. Breathing the morning air in the
doorway, stood a young woman in a cotton gown, a saucepan in hand.
She had inquisitive eyes, a pointed, prying nose, and I knew her
to be the village gossip, the wife of Jules, Monsieur Vigo’s
clerk. She had the same smattering of English as her husband. Now
she stood regarding me narrowly between half-closed lids.
“A la bonne heure! Que fais-tu donc? What do you do so early?”
“The garrison is getting ready to leave for Kentucky to-day,” I
answered.
“Ha! Jules! Ecoute-toi! Nom de dieu! Is it true what you say?”
The visage of Jules, surmounted by a nightcap and heavy with
sleep, appeared behind her.
“Ha, e’est Daveed!” he said. "What news have you?”
I repeated, whereupon they both began to lament.
“And why is it?” persisted Jules.
“He has such faith in the loyalty of the Kaskaskians,” I
answered, parrot-like.
“Diable!” cried Jules, “we shall perish. We shall be as the
Acadians. And loyalty — she will not save us, no.”
Other doors creaked. Other inhabitants came in varied costumes
into the street to hear the news, lamenting. If Clark left, the
day of judgment was at hand for them, that was certain. Between
the savage and the Briton not one stone would be left standing on
another. Madame Jules forgot her breakfast, and fled up the street
with the tidings. And then I made my way to the fort, where the
men were gathering about the camp-fires, talking excitedly.
Terence, relieved from duty, had done the work here.
“And he as little as a fox, wid all that in him,” he cried, when
he perceived me walking demurely past the sentry. "Davy, dear,
come here an’ tell the b’ys am I a liar.”
“Davy’s monstrous cute,” said Bill Cowan; "I reckon he knows as
well as me the Colonel hain’t a-goin’ to do no such tomfool thing
as leave.”
“He is,” I cried, for the benefit of some others, “he’s fair
sick of grumblers that haven’t got the grit to stand by him in
trouble.”
“By the Lord!” said Bill Cowan, “and I’ll not blame him.” He
turned fiercely, his face reddening. "Shame on ye all yere lives,”
he shouted. "Ye’re making the best man that ever led a regiment
take the back trail. Ye’ll fetch back to Kaintuck, and draw every
redskin in the north woods suckin’ after ye like leaves in a
harricane wind. There hain’t a man of ye has the pluck of this
little shaver that beats the drum. I wish to God McChesney was
here.”
He turned away to cross the parade ground, followed by the
faithful Terence and myself. Others gathered about him: McAndrew,
who, for all his sourness, was true; Swein Poulsson, who would
have died for the Colonel; John Duff, and some twenty more,
including Saunders, whose affection had not been killed, though
Clark had nearly hanged him among the prairies.
“Begob!” said Terence, “Davy has inflooence wid his Excellency.
It’s Davy we’ll sind, prayin’ him not to lave the Frinch alone wid
their loyalty.”
It was agreed, and I was to repeat the name of every man that
sent me.
Departing on this embassy, I sped out of the gates of the fort.
But, as I approached the little house where Clark lived, the
humming of a crowd came to my ears, and I saw with astonishment
that the street was blocked. It appeared that the whole of the
inhabitants of Kaskaskia were packed in front of the place.
Wriggling my way through the people, I had barely reached the gate
when I saw Monsieur Vigo and the priest, three Creole gentlemen in
uniform, and several others coming out of the door. They stopped,
and Monsieur Vigo, raising his hand for silence, made a speech in
French to the people. What he said I could not understand, and
when he had finished they broke up into groups, and many of them
departed. Before I could gain the house, Colonel Clark himself
came out with Captain Helm and Captain Harrod. The Colonel glanced
at me and smiled.
“Parade, Davy,” he said, and walked on.
I ran back to the fort, and when I had gotten my drum the three
companies were falling into line, the men murmuring in undertones
among themselves. They were brought to attention. Colonel Clark
was seen to come out of the commandant’s house, and we watched him
furtively as he walked slowly to his place in front of the line. A
tremor of excitement went from sergeant to drummer boy. The
sentries closed the big gates of the fort.
The Colonel stood for a full minute surveying us calmly, — a
disquieting way he had when matters were at a crisis. Then he
began to talk.
“I have heard from many sources that you are dissatisfied, that
you wish to go back to Kentucky. If that be so, I say to you, ’Go,
and God be with you.’ I will hinder no man. We have taken a brave
and generous people into the fold of the Republic, and they have
shown their patriotism by giving us freely of their money and
stores.” He raised his voice. "They have given the last proof of
that patriotism this day. Yes, they have come to me and offered to
take your places, to finish the campaign which you have so well
begun and wish to abandon. To-day I shall enroll their militia
under the flag for which you have fought.”
When he had ceased speaking a murmur ran through the ranks.
“But if there be any,” he said, “who have faith in me and in the
cause for which we have come here, who have the perseverance and
the courage to remain, I will reenlist them. The rest of you shall
march for Kentucky,” he cried, “as soon as Captain Bowman’s
company can be relieved at Cahokia. The regiment is dismissed.”
For a moment they remained in ranks, as though stupefied. It was
Cowan who stepped out first, snatched his coonskin hat from his
head, and waved it in the air.
“Huzzay for Colonel Clark!” he roared. "I’ll foller him into
Canady, and stand up to my lick log.”
They surrounded Bill Cowan, not the twenty which had flocked to
him in the morning, but four times twenty, and they marched in a
body to the commandant’s house to be reenlisted. The Colonel stood
by the door, and there came a light in his eyes as he regarded us.
They cheered him again.
“Thank you, lads,” he said; "remember, we may have to whistle
for our pay.”
“Damn the pay!” cried Bill Cowan, and we echoed the sentiment.
“We’ll see what can be done about land grants,” said the
Colonel, and he turned away.
At dusk that evening I sat on the back door-step, by the
orchard, cleaning his rifle. The sound of steps came from the
little passage behind me, and a hand was on my head.
“Davee,” said a voice (it was Monsieur Vigo’s), “do you know
what is un coup d’état?”
“No, sir.”
“Ha! You execute one to-day. Is it not so, Monsieur le Colonel?”
“I reckon he was in the secret,” said Colonel Clark. "Did you
think I meant to leave Kaskaskia, Davy?”
“No, sir.”
“He is not so easy fool,” Monsieur Vigo put in. "He tell me
paper money good if I take it. C’est la haute finance!”
Colonel Clark laughed.
“And why didn’t you think I meant to leave?” said he.
“Because you bade me go out and tell everybody,” I answered.
"What you really mean to do you tell no one.”
“Nom du bon Dieu!” exclaimed Monsieur Vigo.
Yesterday Colonel Clark had stood alone, the enterprise for
which he had risked all on the verge of failure. By a
master-stroke his ranks were repleted, his position recovered, his
authority secured once more.
Few men recognize genius when they see it. Monsieur Vigo was not
one of these.
I SHOULD make but a poor historian, for I have not stuck to my
chronology. But as I write, the vivid recollections are those that
I set down. I have forgotten two things of great importance.
First, the departure of Father Gibault with several Creole
gentlemen and a spy of Colonel Clark’s for Vincennes, and their
triumphant return in August. The sacrifice of the good priest had
not been in vain, and he came back with the joyous news of a
peaceful conquest. The stars and stripes now waved over the fort,
and the French themselves had put it there. And the vast stretch
of country from that place westward to the Father of Waters was
now American.
And that brings me to the second oversight. The surprise and
conquest of Cahokia by Bowman and his men was like that of
Kaskaskia. And the French there were loyal, too, offering their
militia for service in the place of those men of Bowman’s company
who would not reenlist. These came to Kaskaskia to join our
home-goers, and no sooner had the hundred marched out of the gate
and taken up their way for Kentucky than Colonel Clark began the
drilling of the new troops.
Captain Leonard Helm was sent to take charge of Vincennes, and
Captain Montgomery set out across the mountains for Williamsburg
with letters praying the governor of Virginia to come to our
assistance.
For another cloud had risen in the horizon: another problem for
Clark to face of greater portent than all the others. A messenger
from Captain Bowman at Cohos came riding down the street on a
scraggly French pony, and pulled up before headquarters. The
messenger was Sergeant Thomas McChesney, and his long legs almost
reached the ground on either side of the little beast. Leaping
from the saddle, he seized me in his arms, set me down, and bade
me tell Colonel Clark of his arrival.
It was a sultry August morning. Within the hour Colonel Clark
and Tom and myself were riding over the dusty trace that wound
westward across the common lands of the village, which was known
as the Fort Chartres road. The heat-haze shimmered in the
distance, and there was no sound in plain or village save the
tinkle of a cowbell from the clumps of shade. Colonel Clark rode
twenty paces in front, alone, his head bowed with thinking.
“They’re coming into Cahokia as thick as bees out’n a gum,
Davy,” said Tom; "seems like there’s thousands of ’em. Nothin’
will do ’em but they must see the Colonel, — the varmints. And
they’ve got patience, they’ll wait thar till the b’ars git fat. I
reckon they ’low Clark’s got the armies of Congress behind him. If
they knowed,” said Tom, with a chuckle, “if they knowed that we’d
only got seventy of the boys and some hundred Frenchies in the
army! I reckon the Colonel’s too cute for ’em.”
The savages in Cahokia were as the leaves of the forest.
Curiosity, that mainspring of the Indian character, had brought
the chiefs, big and little, to see with their own eyes the great
Captain of the Long Knives. In vain had the faithful Bowman put
them off. They would wait. Clark must come. And Clark was coming,
for he was not the man to quail at such a crisis. For the crux of
the whole matter was here. And if he failed to impress them with
his power, with the might of the Congress for which he fought, no
man of his would ever see Kentucky again.
As we rode through the bottom under the pecan trees we talked of
Polly Ann, Tom and I, and of our little home by the Salt River far
to the southward, where we would live in peace when the campaign
was over. Tom had written her, painfully enough, an affectionate
scrawl, which he sent by one of Captain Linn’s men. And I, too,
had written. My letter had been about Tom, and how he had become a
sergeant, and what a favorite he was with Bowman and the Colonel.
Poor Polly Ann! She could not write, but a runner from Harrodstown
who was a friend of Tom’s had carried all the way to Cahokia, in
the pocket with his despatches, a fold of nettle-bark linen. Tom
pulled it from the bosom of his hunting shirt to show me, and in
it was a little ring of hair like unto the finest spun red-gold.
This was the message Polly Ann had sent, — a message from little Tom
as well.
At Prairie du Rocher, at St. Philippe, the inhabitants lined the
streets to do homage to this man of strange power who rode,
unattended and unafraid, to the council of the savage tribes which
had terrorized his people of Kentucky. From the ramparts of Fort
Chartres (once one of the mighty chain of strongholds to protect a
new France, and now deserted like Massacre), I gazed for the first
time in awe at the turgid flood of the Mississippi, and at the
lands of the Spanish king beyond. With never ceasing fury the
river tore at his clay banks and worried the green islands that
braved his charge. And my boyish fancy pictured to itself the
monsters which might lie hidden in his muddy depths.
We lay that night in the open at a spring on the bluffs, and the
next morning beheld the church tower of Cahokia. A little way from
the town we perceived an odd gathering on the road, the yellowed
and weathered hunting shirts of Bowman’s company mixed with the
motley dress of the Creole volunteers. Some of these gentlemen
wore the costume of coureurs du bois, others had odd regimental
coats and hats which had seen much service. Besides the military
was a sober deputation of citizens, and hovering behind the whole
a horde of curious, blanketed braves, come to get a first glimpse
of the great white captain. So escorted, we crossed at the mill,
came to a shady street that faced the little river, and stopped at
the stone house where Colonel Clark was to abide.
On that day, and for many days more, that street was thronged
with warriors. Chiefs in gala dress strutted up and down,
feathered and plumed and blanketed, smeared with paint, bedecked
with rude jewellery, — earrings and bracelets. From the remote
forests of the north they had come, where the cold winds blow off
the blue lakes; from the prairies to the east; from the upper
running waters, where the Mississippi flows clear and undefiled by
the muddy flood; from the villages and wigwams of the sluggish
Wabash; and from the sandy, piny country between the great
northern seas where Michilimackinac stands guard alone, — Sacs and
Foxes, Chippeways and Maumies and Missesogies, Puans and
Pottawattomies, chiefs and medicine men.
Well might the sleep of the good citizens be disturbed, and the
women fear to venture to the creek with their linen and their
paddles!
The lives of these people hung in truth upon a slender thing — the
bearing of one man. All day long the great chiefs sought an
audience with him, but he sent them word that matters would be
settled in the council that was to come. All day long the warriors
lined the picket fence in front of the house, and more than once
Tom McChesney roughly shouldered a lane through them that timid
visitors might pass. Like a pack of wolves, they watched narrowly
for any sign of weakness. As for Tom, they were to him as so many
dogs.
“Ye varmints!” he cried, “I’ll take a blizz’rd at ye if ye don’t
keep the way clear.”
At that they would give back grudgingly with a chorus of grunts,
only to close in again as tightly as before. But they came to have
a wholesome regard for the sun-browned man with the red hair who
guarded the Colonel’s privacy. The boy who sat on the door-step,
the son of the great Pale Face Chief (as they called me), was a
never ending source of comment among them. Once Colonel Clark sent
for me. The little front room of this house was not unlike the one
we had occupied at Kaskaskia. It had bare walls, a plain table and
chairs, and a crucifix in the corner. It served as dining room,
parlor, bedroom, for there was a pallet too. Now the table was
covered with parchments and papers, and beside Colonel Clark sat a
grave gentleman of about his own age. As I came into the room
Colonel Clark relaxed, turned toward this gentleman, and said: —
“Monsieur Gratiot, behold my commissary-general, my strategist,
my financier.” And Monsieur Gratiot smiled. He struck me as a man
who never let himself go sufficiently to laugh.
“Ah,” he said, “Vigo has told me how he settled the question of
paper money. He might do something for the Congress in the East.”
“Davy is a Scotchman, like John Law,” said the Colonel, “and he
is a master at perceiving a man’s character and business.
“What would you call me, at a venture, Davy?” asked Monsieur
Gratiot.
He spoke excellent English, with only a slight accent.
“A citizen of the world, like Monsieur Vigo,” I answered at a
hazard.
“Pardieu!” said Monsieur Gratiot, “you are not far away. Like
Monsieur Vigo I keep a store here at Cahokia. Like Monsieur Vigo,
I have travelled much in my day. Do you know where Switzerland is,
Davy?”
I did not.
“It is a country set like a cluster of jewels in the heart of
Europe,” said Monsieur Gratiot, “and there are mountains there
that rise among the clouds and are covered with perpetual snows.
And when the sun sets on those snows they are rubies, and the
skies above them sapphire.”
“I was born amongst the mountains, sir,” I answered, my pulse
quickening at his description, “but they were not so high as those
you speak of.”
“Then,” said Monsieur Gratiot, “you can understand a little my
sorrow as a lad when I left it. From Switzerland I went to a foggy
place called London, and thence I crossed the ocean to the solemn
forests of the north of Canada, where I was many years, learning
the characters of these gentlemen who are looking in upon us.” And
he waved his arm at the line of peering red faces by the pickets.
Monsieur Gratiot smiled at Clark. "And there’s another point of
resemblance between myself and Monsieur Vigo.”
“Have you taken the paper money?” I demanded.
Monsieur Gratiot slapped his linen breeches. "That I have,” and
this time I thought he was going to laugh. But he did not, though
his eyes sparkled. "And do you think that the good Congress will
ever repay me, Davy?”
“No, sir,” said I.
“Peste!” exclaimed Monsieur Gratiot, but he did not seem to be
offended or shaken.
“Davy,” said Colonel Clark, “we have had enough of predictions
for the present. Fetch this letter to Captain Bowman at the
garrison up the street.” He handed me the letter. "Are you afraid
of the Indians?”
“If I were, sir, I would not show it,” I said, for he had
encouraged me to talk freely to him.
“Avast!” cried the Colonel, as I was going out. "And why not?”
“If I show that I am not afraid of them, sir, they will think
that you are the less so.”
“There you are for strategy, Gratiot,” said Colonel Clark,
laughing. "Get out, you rascal.”
Tom was more concerned when I appeared.
“Don’t pester ’em, Davy,” said he; "fer God’s sake don’t pester
’em. They’re spoilin’ fer a fight. Stand back thar, ye critters,”
he shouted, brandishing his rifle in their faces. "Ugh, I reckon
it wouldn’t take a horse or a dog to scent ye to-day. Rank b’ar’s
oil! Kite along, Davy.”
Clutching the letter tightly, I slipped between the narrowed
ranks, and gained the middle of the street, not without a
quickened beat of my heart. Thence I sped, dodging this group and
that, until I came to the long log house that was called the
garrison. Here our men were stationed, where formerly a squad from
an English regiment was quartered. I found Captain Bowman,
delivered the letter, and started back again through the brown,
dusty street, which lay in the shade of the great forest trees
that still lined it, doubling now and again to avoid an idling
brave that looked bent upon mischief. For a single mischance might
set the tide running to massacre. I was nearing the gate again,
the dust flying from my moccasined feet, the sight of the stalwart
Tom giving me courage again. Suddenly, with the deftness of a
panther, an Indian shot forward and lifted me high in his arms. To
this day I recall my terror as I dangled in mid-air, staring into
a hideous face. By intuition I kicked him in the stomach with all
my might, and with a howl of surprise and rage his fingers gripped
into my flesh. The next thing I remember was being in the dust,
suffocated by that odor which he who has known it can never
forget. A medley of discordant cries was in my ears. Then I was
snatched up, bumped against heads and shoulders, and deposited
somewhere. Now it was Tom’s face that was close to mine, and the
light of a fierce anger was in his blue eyes.
“Did they hurt ye, Davy?” he asked.
I shook my head. Before I could speak he was at the gate again,
confronting the mob of savages that swayed against the fence, and
the street was filled with running figures. A voice of command
that I knew well came from behind me. It was Colonel Clark’s.
“Stay where you are, McChesney!” he shouted, and Tom halted with
his hand on the latch.
“With your permission, I will speak to them,” said Monsieur
Gratiot, who had come out also.
I looked up at him, and he was as calm as when he had joked with
me a quarter of an hour since.
“Very well,” said Clark, briefly.
Monsieur Gratiot surveyed them scornfully.
“Where is the Hungry Wolf, who speaks English?” he said.
There was a stir in the rear ranks, and a lean savage with
abnormal cheek bones pushed forward.
“Hungry Wolf here,” he said with a grunt.
“The Hungry Wolf knew the French trader at Michilimackinac,”
said Monsieur Gratiot. "He knows that the French trader’s word is
a true word. Let the Hungry Wolf tell his companions that the
Chief of the Long Knives is very angry.”
The Hungry Wolf turned, and began to speak. His words, hoarse
and resonant, seemed to come from the depths of his body.
Presently he paused, and there came an answer from the fiend who
had seized me. After that there were many grunts, and the Hungry
Wolf turned again.
“The North Wind mean no harm,” he answered. "He play with the
son of the Great White Chief, and his belly is very sore where the
Chief’s son kicked him.”
“The Chief of the Long Knives will consider the offence,” said
Monsieur Gratiot, and retired into the house with Colonel Clark.
For a full five minutes the Indians waited, impassive. And then
Monsieur Gratiot reappeared, alone.
“The Chief of the Long Knives is mercifully inclined to
forgive,” he said. "It was in play. But there must be no more play
with the Chief’s son. And the path to the Great Chief’s presence
must be kept clear.”
Again the Hungry Wolf translated. The North Wind grunted and
departed in silence, followed by many of his friends. And indeed
for a while after that the others kept a passage clear to the
gate.
As for the son of the Great White Chief, he sat for a long time
that afternoon beside the truck patch of the house. And presently
he slipped out by a byway into the street again, among the
savages. His heart was bumping in his throat, but a boyish
reasoning told him that he must show no fear. And that day he
found what his Colonel had long since learned to be true that in
courage is the greater safety. The power of the Great White Chief
was such that he allowed his son to go forth alone, and feared not
for his life. Even so Clark himself walked among them, nor looked
to right or left.
Two nights Colonel Clark sat through, calling now on this man
and now on that, and conning the treaties which the English had
made with the various tribes — ay, and French and Spanish treaties
too — until he knew them all by heart. There was no haste in what he
did, no uneasiness in his manner. He listened to the advice of
Monsieur Gratiot and other Creole gentlemen of weight, to the
Spanish officers who came in their regimentals from St. Louis out
of curiosity to see how this man would treat with the tribes. For
he spoke of his intentions to none of them, and gained the more
respect by it. Within the week the council began; and the scene of
the great drama was a field near the village, the background of
forest trees. Few plays on the world’s stage have held such
suspense, few battles such excitement for those who watched. Here
was the spectacle of one strong man’s brain pitted against the
combined craft of the wilderness. In the midst of a stretch of
waving grass was a table, and a young man of six-and-twenty sat
there alone. Around him were ringed the gathered tribes, each
chief in the order of his importance squatted in the inner circle,
their blankets making patches of bright color against the green.
Behind the tribes was the little group of hunting shirts, the men
leaning on the barrels of their long rifles, indolent but
watchful. Here and there a gay uniform of a Spanish or Creole
officer, and behind these all the population of the village that
dared to show itself.
The ceremonies began with the kindling of the council fire, — a
rite handed down through unknown centuries of Indian usage. By it
nations had been made and unmade, broad lands passed, even as they
now might pass. The yellow of its crackling flames was shamed by
the summer sun, and the black smoke of it was wafted by the south
wind over the forest. Then for three days the chiefs spoke, and a
man listened, unmoved. The sound of these orations, wild and
fearful to my boyish ear, comes back to me now. Yet there was a
cadence in it, a music of notes now falling, now rising to a
passion and intensity that thrilled us.
Bad birds flying through the land (the British agents) had
besought them to take up the bloody hatchet. They had sinned. They
had listened to the lies which the bad birds had told of the Big
Knives, they had taken their presents. But now the Great Spirit in
His wisdom had brought themselves and the Chief of the Big Knives
together. Therefore (suiting the action to the word) they stamped
on the bloody belt, and rent in pieces the emblems of the White
King across the water. So said the interpreters, as the chiefs one
after another tore the miniature British flags which had been
given them into bits. On the evening of the third day the White
Chief rose in his chair, gazing haughtily about him. There was a
deep silence.
“Tell your chiefs,” he said, “tell your chiefs that to-morrow I
will give them an answer. And upon the manner in which they
receive that answer depends the fate of your nations. Good night.”
They rose and, thronging around him, sought to take his hand.
But Clark turned from them.
“Peace is not yet come,” he said sternly. "It is time to take
the hand when the heart is given with it.”
A feathered headsman of one of the tribes gave back with dignity
and spoke.
“It is well said by the Great Chief of the Pale Faces,” he
answered; "these in truth are not the words of a man with a double
tongue.”
So they sought their quarters for the night, and suspense hung
breathless over the village.
There were many callers at the stone house that evening, — Spanish
officers, Creole gentlemen, an English Canadian trader or two.
With my elbow on the sill of the open window I watched them
awhile, listening with a boy’s eagerness to what they had to say
of the day’s doings. They disputed amongst themselves in various
degrees of English as to the manner of treating the red man, — now
gesticulating, now threatening, now seizing a rolled parchment
treaty from the table. Clark sat alone, a little apart, silent
save a word now and then in a low tone to Monsieur Gratiot or
Captain Bowman. Here was an odd assortment of the races which had
overrun the new world. At intervals some disputant would pause in
his talk to kill a mosquito or fight away a moth or a June-bug,
but presently the argument reached such a pitch that the
mosquitoes fed undisturbed.
“You have done much, sir,” said the Spanish commandant of St.
Louis, “but the savage, he will never be content without present.
He will never be won without present.”
Clark was one of those men who are perforce listened to when
they begin to speak.
“Captain de Leyba,” said he, “I know not what may be the present
policy of his Spanish Majesty with McGillivray and his Creeks in
the south, but this I do believe,” and he brought down his fist
among the papers, “that the old French and Spanish treaties were
right in principle. Here are copies of the English treaties that I
have secured, and in them thousands of sovereigns have been thrown
away. They are so much waste paper. Gentlemen, the Indians are
children. If you give them presents, they believe you to be afraid
of them. I will deal with them without presents; and if I had the
gold of the Bank of England stored in the garrison there, they
should not touch a piece of it.”
But Captain de Leyba, incredulous, raised his eyebrows and
shrugged.
“Por Dios,” he cried, “whoever hear of one man and fifty militia
subduing the northern tribes without a piastre?”
After a while the Colonel called me in, and sent me speeding
across the little river with a note to a certain Mr. Brady, whose
house was not far away. Like many another citizen of Cahokia, Mr.
Brady was terror-ridden. A party of young Puan bucks had decreed
it to be their pleasure to encamp in Mr. Brady’s yard, to peer
through the shutters into Mr. Brady’s house, to enjoy themselves
by annoying Mr. Brady’s family and others as much as possible.
During the Indian occupation of Cahokia this band had gained a
well-deserved reputation for mischief; and chief among them was
the North Wind himself, whom I had done the honor to kick in the
stomach. To-night they had made a fire in this Mr. Brady’s
flower-garden, over which they were cooking venison steaks. And,
as I reached the door, the North Wind spied me, grinned, rubbed
his stomach, made a false dash at me that frightened me out of my
wits, and finally went through the pantomime of scalping me. I
stood looking at him with my legs apart, for the son of the Great
Chief must not run away. And I marked that the North Wind had two
great ornamental daubs like shutter-fastenings painted on his
cheeks. I sniffed preparation, too, on his followers, and I was
sure they were getting ready for some new deviltry. I handed the
note to Mr. Brady through the crack of the door that he vouchsafed
to me, and when he had slammed and bolted me out, I ran into the
street and stood for some time behind the trunk of a big hickory,
watching the followers of the North Wind. Some were painting
themselves, others cleaning their rifles and sharpening their
scalping knives. All jabbered unceasingly. Now and again a silent
brave passed, paused a moment to survey them gravely, grunted an
answer to something they would fling at him, and went on. At
length arrived three chiefs whom I knew to be high in the
councils. The North Wind came out to them, and the four blanketed
forms stood silhouetted between me and the fire for a quarter of
an hour. By this time I was sure of a plot, and fled away to
another tree for fear of detection. At length stalked through the
street the Hungry Wolf, the interpreter. I knew this man to be
friendly to Clark, and I acted on impulse. He gave a grunt of
surprise when I halted before him. I made up my mind.
“The son of the Great Chief knows that the Puans have wickedness
in their hearts to-night,” I said; "the tongue of the Hungry Wolf
does not lie.”
The big Indian drew back with another grunt, and the distant
firelight flashed on his eyes as on polished black flints.
“Umrrhh! Is the Pale Face Chief’s son a prophet?”
“The anger of the Pale Face Chief and of his countrymen is as
the hurricane,” I said, scarce believing my own ears. For a lad is
imitative by nature, and I had not listened to the interpreters
for three days without profit.
The Hungry Wolf grunted again, after which he was silent for a
long time. Then he said: —
“Let the Chief of the Long Knives have guard tonight.” And
suddenly he was gone into the darkness.
I waded the creek and sped to Clark. He was alone now, the
shutters of the room closed. And as I came in I could scarce
believe that he was the same masterful man I had seen at the
council that day, and at the conference an hour gone. He was once
more the friend at whose feet I sat in private, who talked to me
as a companion and a father.
“Where have you been, Davy?” he asked. And then, “What is it, my
lad?”
I crept close to him and told him in a breathless undertone, and
I knew that I was shaking the while. He listened gravely, and when
I had finished laid a firm hand on my head.
“There,” he said, “you are a brave lad, and a canny.”
He thought a minute, his hand still resting on my head, and then
rose and led me to the back door of the house. It was near
midnight, and the sounds of the place were stilling, the crickets
chirping in the grass.
“Run to Captain Bowman and tell him to send ten men to this
door. But they must come man by man, to escape detection. Do you
understand?” I nodded and was starting, but he still held me. "God
bless you, Davy, you are a brave boy.”
He closed the door softly and I sped away, my moccasins making
no sound on the soft dirt. I reached the garrison, was challenged
by Jack Terrill, the guard, and brought by him to Bowman’s room.
The Captain sat, undressed, at the edge of his bed. But he was a
man of action, and strode into the long room where his company was
sleeping and gave his orders without delay.
Half an hour later there was no light in the village. The
Colonel’s headquarters were dark, but in the kitchen a dozen tall
men were waiting.
SO FAR as the world knew, the Chief of the Long Knives slept
peacefully in his house. And such was his sense of power that not
even a sentry paced the street without. For by these things is the
Indian mind impressed. In the tiny kitchen a dozen men and a boy
tried to hush their breathing, and sweltered. For it was very hot,
and the pent-up odor of past cookings was stifling to men used to
the open. In a corner, hooded under a box, was a lighted lantern,
and Tom McChesney stood ready to seize it at the first alarm. On
such occasions the current of time runs sluggish. Thrice our
muscles were startled into tenseness by the baying of a hound, and
once a cock crew out of all season. For the night was cloudy and
pitchy black, and the dawn as far away as eternity.
Suddenly I knew that every man in the room was on the alert, for
the skilled frontiersman, when watchful, has a sixth sense. None
of them might have told you what he had heard. The next sound was
the faint creaking of Colonel Clark’s door as it opened. Wrapping
a blanket around the lantern, Tom led the way, and we massed
ourselves behind the front door. Another breathing space, and then
the war-cry of the Puans broke hideously on the night, and
children woke, crying, from their sleep. In two bounds our little
detachment was in the street, the fire spouting red from the
Deckards, faint, shadowy forms fading along the line of trees.
After that an uproar of awakening, cries here and there, a drum
beating madly for the militia. The dozen flung themselves across
the stream, I hot in their wake, through Mr. Brady’s gate, which
was open; and there was a scene of sweet tranquillity under the
lantern’s rays, — the North Wind and his friends wrapped in their
blankets and sleeping the sleep of the just.
“Damn the sly varmints,” cried Tom, and he turned over the North
Wind with his foot, as a log.
With a grunt of fury the Indian shed his blanket and scrambled
to his feet, and stood glaring at us through his paint. But
suddenly he met the fixed sternness of Clark’s gaze, and his own
shifted. By this time his followers were up. The North Wind raised
his hands to heaven in token of his innocence, and then spread his
palms outward. Where was the proof?
“Look!” I cried, quivering with excitement; "look, their
leggings and moccasins are wet!”
“There’s no devil if they beant!” said Tom, and there was a
murmur of approval from the other men.
“The boy is right,” said the Colonel, and turned to Tom.
"Sergeant, have the chiefs put in irons.” He swung on his heel,
and without more ado went back to his house to bed. The North Wind
and two others were easily singled out as the leaders, and were
straightway escorted to the garrison house, their air of injured
innocence availing them not a whit. The militia was dismissed, and
the village was hushed once more.
But all night long the chiefs went to and fro, taking counsel
among themselves. What would the Chief of the Pale Faces do?
The morning came with a cloudy, damp dawning. Within a decent
time (for the Indian is decorous) blanketed deputations filled the
archways under the trees and waited there as the minutes ran into
hours. The Chief of the Long Knives surveyed the morning from his
door-step, and his eyes rested on a solemn figure at the gate. It
was the Hungry Wolf. Sorrow was in his voice, and he bore messages
from the twenty great chiefs who stood beyond. They were come to
express their abhorrence of the night’s doings, of which they were
as innocent as the deer of the forest.
“Let the Hungry Wolf tell the chiefs,” said Colonel Clark,
briefly, “that the council is the place for talk.”
And he went back into the house again.
Then he bade me run to Captain Bowman with an order to bring the
North Wind and his confederates to the council field in irons.
The day followed the promise of the dawn. The clouds hung low,
and now and again great drops struck the faces of the people in
the field. And like the heavens, the assembly itself was charged
with we knew not what. Was it peace or war? As before, a white man
sat with supreme indifference at a table, and in front of him
three most unhappy chiefs squatted in the grass, the shame of
their irons hidden under the blanket folds. Audacity is truly a
part of the equipment of genius. To have rescued the North Wind
and his friends would have been child’s play; to have retired from
the council with threats of war, as easy.
And yet they craved pardon.
One chief after another rose with dignity in the ring and came
to the table to plead. An argument deserving mention was that the
North Wind had desired to test the friendship of the French for
the Big Knives, — set forth without a smile. To all pleaders Colonel
Clark shook his head. He, being a warrior, cared little whether
such people were friends or foes. He held them in the hollow of
his hand. And at length they came no more.
The very clouds seemed to hang motionless when he rose to speak,
and you who will may read in his memoir what he said. The Hungry
Wolf caught the spirit of it, and was eloquent in his own tongue,
and no word of it was lost. First he told them of the causes of
war, of the thirteen council fires with the English, and in terms
that the Indian mind might grasp, and how their old father, the
French King, had joined the Big Knives in this righteous fight.
“Warriors,” said he, “here is a bloody belt and a white one;
take which you choose. But behave like men. Should it be the
bloody path, you may leave this town in safety to join the
English, and we shall then see which of us can stain our shirts
with the most blood. But, should it be the path of peace as
brothers of the Big Knives and of their friends the French, and
then you go to your homes and listen to the bad birds, you will
then no longer deserve to be called men and warriors, — but
creatures of two tongues, which ought to be destroyed. Let us then
part this evening in the hope that the Great Spirit will bring us
together again with the sun as brothers.”
So the council broke up. White man and red went trooping into
town, staring curiously at the guard which was leading the North
Wind and his friends to another night of meditation. What their
fate would be no man knew. Many thought the tomahawk.
That night the citizens of the little village of Pain Court, as
St. Louis was called, might have seen the sky reddened in the
eastward. It was the loom of many fires at Cahokia, and around
them the chiefs of the forty tribes — all save the three in durance
vile — were gathered in solemn talk. Would they take the bloody belt
or the white one? No man cared so little as the Pale Face Chief.
When their eyes were turned from the fitful blaze of the logs, the
gala light of many candles greeted them. And above the sound of
their own speeches rose the merrier note of the fiddle. The
garrison windows shone like lanterns, and behind these Creole and
backwoodsman swung the village ladies in the gay French dances.
The man at whose bidding this merrymaking was held stood in a
corner watching with folded arms, and none to look at him might
know that he was playing for a stake.
The troubled fires of the Indians had died to embers long before
the candles were snuffed in the garrison house and the music
ceased.
The sun himself was pleased to hail that last morning of the
great council, and beamed with torrid tolerance upon the ceremony
of kindling the greatest of the fires. On this morning Colonel
Clark did not sit alone, but was surrounded by men of weight, — by
Monsieur Gratiot and other citizens, Captain Bowman and the
Spanish officers. And when at length the brush crackled and the
flames caught the logs, three of the mightiest chiefs arose. The
greatest, victor in fifty tribal wars, held in his hand the white
belt of peace. The second bore a long-stemmed pipe with a huge
bowl. And after him, with measured steps, a third came with a
smoking censer, — the sacred fire with which to kindle the pipe.
Halting before Clark, he first swung the censer to the heavens,
then to the earth, then to all the spirits of the air, — calling
these to witness that peace was come at last, — and finally to the
Chief of the Long Knives and to the gentlemen of dignity about his
person. Next the Indian turned, and spoke to his brethren in
measured, sonorous tones. He bade them thank that Great Spirit who
had cleared the sky and opened their ears and hearts that they
might receive the truth, — who had laid bare to their understanding
the lies of the English. Even as these English had served the Big
Knives, so might they one day serve the Indians. Therefore he
commanded them to cast the tomahawk into the river, and when they
should return to their land to drive the evil birds from it. And
they must send their wise men to Kaskaskia to hear the words of
wisdom of the Great White Chief, Clark. He thanked the Great
Spirit for this council fire which He had kindled at Cahokia.
Lifting the bowl of the censer, in the eyes of all the people he
drew in a long whiff to bear witness of peace. After him the pipe
went the interminable rounds of the chiefs. Colonel Clark took it,
and puffed; Captain Bowman puffed, — everybody puffed.
“Davy must have a pull,” cried Tom; and even the chiefs smiled
as I coughed and sputtered, while my friends roared with laughter.
It gave me no great notion of the fragrance of tobacco. And then
came such a hand-shaking and grunting as a man rarely sees in a
lifetime.
There was but one disquieting question left: What was to become
of the North Wind and his friends? None dared mention the matter
at such a time. But at length, as the day wore on to afternoon,
the Colonel was seen to speak quietly to Captain Bowman, and
several backwoodsmen went off toward the town. And presently a
silence fell on the company as they beheld the dejected three
crossing the field with a guard. They were led before Clark, and
when he saw them his face hardened to sternness.
“It is only women who watch to catch a bear sleeping,” he said.
"The Big Knives do not kill women. I shall give you meat for your
journey home, for women cannot hunt. If you remain here, you shall
be treated as squaws. Set the women free.”
Tom McChesney cast off their irons. As for Clark, he began to
talk immediately with Monsieur Gratiot, as though he had dismissed
them from his mind. And their agitation was a pitiful thing to
see. In vain they pressed about him, in vain they even pulled the
fringe of his shirt to gain his attention. And then they went
about among the other chiefs, but these dared not intercede.
Uneasiness was written on every man’s face, and the talk went
haltingly. But Clark was serenity itself. At length with a supreme
effort they plucked up courage to come again to the table, one
holding out the belt of peace, and the other the still smouldering
pipe.
Clark paused in his talk. He took the belt, and flung it away
over the heads of those around him. He seized the pipe, and taking
up his sword from the table drew it, and with one blow clave the
stem in half. There was no anger in either act, but much
deliberation.
“The Big Knives,” he said scornfully, “do not treat with women.”
The pleading began again, the Hungry Wolf interpreting with
tremors of earnestness. Their lives were spared, but to what
purpose, since the White Chief looked with disfavor upon them? Let
him know that bad men from Michilimackinac put the deed into their
hearts.
“When the Big Knives come upon such people in the wilderness,”
Clark answered, “they shoot them down that they may not eat the
deer. But they have never talked of it.”
He turned from them once more; they went away in a dejection to
wring our compassion, and we thought the matter ended at last. The
sun was falling low, the people beginning to move away, when, to
the astonishment of all, the culprits were seen coming back again.
With them were two young men of their own nation. The Indians
opened up a path for them to pass through, and they came as men go
to the grave. So mournful, so impressive withal, that the crowd
fell into silence again, and the Colonel turned his eyes. The two
young men sank down on the ground before him and shrouded their
heads in their blankets.
“What is this?” Clark demanded.
The North Wind spoke in a voice of sorrow: —
“An atonement to the Great White Chief for the sins of our
nation. Perchance the Great Chief will deign to strike a tomahawk
into their heads, that our nation may be saved in war by the Big
Knives.” And the North Wind held forth the pipe once more.
“I have nothing to say to you,” said Clark.
Still they stood irresolute, their minds now bereft of
expedients. And the young men sat motionless on the ground. As
Clark talked they peered out from under their blankets, once,
twice, thrice. He was still talking to the wondering Monsieur
Gratiot. But no other voice was heard, and the eyes of all were
turned on him in amazement. But at last, when the drama had risen
to the pitch of unbearable suspense, he looked down upon the two
miserable pyramids at his feet, and touched them. The blankets
quivered.
“Stand up,” said the Colonel, “and uncover.”
They rose, cast the blankets from them, and stood with a stoic
dignity awaiting his pleasure. Wonderful, fine-limbed men they
were, and for the first time Clark’s eyes were seen to kindle.
“I thank the Great Spirit,” said he, in a loud voice, “that I
have found men among your nation. That I have at last discovered
the real chiefs of your people. Had they sent such as you to treat
with me in the beginning all might have been well. Go back to your
people as their chiefs, and tell them that through you the Big
Knives have granted peace to your nation.”
Stepping forward, he grasped them each by the hand, and, despite
training, joy shone in their faces, while a long-drawn murmur
arose from the assemblage. But Clark did not stop there. He
presented them to Captain Bowman and to the French and Spanish
gentlemen present, and they were hailed by their own kind as
chiefs of their nation. To cap it all our troops, backwoodsmen and
Creole militia, paraded in line on the common, and fired a salute
in their honor.
Thus did Clark gain the friendship of the forty tribes in the
Northwest country.
CHAPTER XVIII.
“an’ ye had been where i had been”
WE WENT back to Kaskaskia, Colonel Clark, Tom, and myself, and a
great weight was lifted from our hearts.
A peaceful autumn passed, and we were happy save when we thought
of those we had left at home. There is no space here to tell of
many incidents. Great chiefs who had not been to the council came
hundreds of leagues across wide rivers that they might see with
their own eyes this man who had made peace without gold, and these
had to be amused and entertained.
The apples ripened, and were shaken to the ground by the winds.
The good Father Gibault, true to his promise, strove to teach me
French. Indeed, I picked up much of that language in my
intercourse with the inhabitants of Kaskaskia. How well I recall
that simple life, — its dances, its songs, and the games with the
laughing boys and girls on the common! And the good people were
very kind to the orphan that dwelt with Colonel Clark, the drummer
boy of his regiment.
But winter brought forebodings. When the garden patches grew
bare and brown, and the bleak winds from across the Mississippi
swept over the common, untoward tidings came like water dripping
from a roof, bit by bit. And day by day Colonel Clark looked
graver. The messengers he had sent to Vincennes came not back, and
the coureurs and traders from time to time brought rumors of a
British force gathering like a thundercloud in the northeast.
Monsieur Vigo himself, who had gone to Vincennes on his own
business, did not return. As for the inhabitants, some of them who
had once bowed to us with a smile now passed with faces averted.
The cold set the miry roads like cement, in ruts and ridges. A
flurry of snow came and powdered the roofs even as the French
loaves are powdered.
It was January. There was Colonel Clark on a runt of an Indian
pony; Tom McChesney on another, riding ahead, several French
gentlemen seated on stools in a two-wheeled cart, and myself. We
were going to Cahokia, and it was very cold, and when the tireless
wheels bumped from ridge to gully, the gentlemen grabbed each
other as they slid about, and laughed.
All at once the merriment ceased, and looking forward we saw
that Tom had leaped from his saddle and was bending over something
in the snow. These chanced to be the footprints of some twenty
men.
The immediate result of this alarming discovery was that Tom
went on express to warn Captain Bowman, and the rest of us
returned to a painful scene at Kaskaskia. We reached the village,
the French gentlemen leaped down from their stools in the cart,
and in ten minutes the streets were filled with frenzied, hooded
figures. Hamilton, called the Hair Buyer, was upon them with no
less than six hundred, and he would hang them to their own
gateposts for listening to the Long Knives. These were but a
handful after all was said. There was Father Gibault, for example.
Father Gibault would doubtless be exposed to the crows in the
belfry of his own church because he had busied himself at
Vincennes and with other matters. Father Gibault was human, and
therefore lovable. He bade his parishioners a hasty and tearful
farewell, and he made a cold and painful journey to the
territories of his Spanish Majesty across the Mississippi.
Father Gibault looked back, and against the gray of the winter’s
twilight there were flames like red maple leaves. In the fort the
men stood to their guns, their faces flushed with staring at the
burning houses. Only a few were burned, — enough to give no cover
for Hamilton and his six hundred if they came.
But they did not come. The faithful Bowman and his men arrived
instead, with the news that there had been only a roving party of
forty, and these were now in full retreat.
Father Gibault came back. But where was Hamilton? This was the
disquieting thing.
One bitter day, when the sun smiled mockingly on the powdered
common, a horseman was perceived on the Fort Chartres road. It was
Monsieur Vigo returning from Vincennes, but he had been first to
St. Louis by reason of the value he set upon his head. Yes,
Monsieur Vigo had been to Vincennes, remaining a little longer
than he expected, the guest of Governor Hamilton. So Governor
Hamilton had recaptured that place! Monsieur Vigo was no spy,
hence he had gone first to St. Louis. Governor Hamilton was at
Vincennes with much of King George’s gold, and many supplies, and
certain Indians who had not been at the council. Eight hundred in
all, said Monsieur Vigo, using his fingers. And it was Governor
Hamilton’s design to march upon Kaskaskia and Cahokia and sweep
over Kentucky; nay, he had already sent certain emissaries to
McGillivray and his Creeks and the Southern Indians with presents,
and these were to press forward on their side. The Governor could
do nothing now, but would move as soon as the rigors of winter had
somewhat relented. Monsieur Vigo shook his head and shrugged his
shoulders. He loved les Américains. What would Monsieur le Colonel
do now?
Monsieur le Colonel was grave, but this was his usual manner. He
did not tear his hair, but the ways of the Long Knives were past
understanding. He asked many questions. How was it with the
garrison at Vincennes? Monsieur Vigo was exact, as a business man
should be. They were now reduced to eighty men, and five hundred
savages had gone out to ravage. There was no chance, then, of
Hamilton moving at present? Monsieur Vigo threw up his hands.
Never had he made such a trip, and he had been forced to come back
by a northern route. The Wabash was as the Great Lakes, and the
forests grew out of the water. A fox could not go to Vincennes in
this weather. A fish? Monsieur Vigo laughed heartily. Yes, a fish
might.
“Then,” said Colonel Clark, “we will be fish.”
Monsieur Vigo stared, and passed his hand from his forehead
backwards over his long hair. I leaned forward in my corner by the
hickory fire.
“Then we will be fish,” said Colonel Clark. "Better that than
food for the crows. For, if we stay here, we shall be caught like
bears in a trap, and Kentucky will be at Hamilton’s mercy.”
“Sacré!” exclaimed Monsieur Vigo, “you are mad, mon ami. I know
what this country is, and you cannot get to Vincennes.”
“I will get to Vincennes,” said Colonel Clark, so gently that
Monsieur Vigo knew he meant it. “I will swim to Vincennes.”
Monsieur Vigo raised his hands to heaven. The three of us went
out of the door and walked. There was a snowy place in front of
the church all party-colored like a clown’s coat, — scarlet capotes,
yellow capotes, and blue capotes, and bright silk handkerchiefs.
They surrounded the Colonel. Pardieu, what was he to do now? For
the British governor and his savages were coming to take revenge
on them because, in their necessity, they had declared for
Congress. Colonel Clark went silently on his way to the gate; but
Monsieur Vigo stopped, and Kaskaskia heard, with a shock, that
this man of iron was to march against Vincennes.
The gates of the fort were shut, and the captains summoned.
Undaunted woodsmen as they were, they were lukewarm, at first, at
the idea of this march through the floods. Who can blame them?
They had, indeed, sacrificed much. But in ten minutes they had
caught his enthusiasm (which is one of the mysteries of genius).
And the men paraded in the snow likewise caught it, and swung
their hats at the notion of taking the Hair Buyer.
“’Tis no news to me,” said Terence, stamping his feet on the
flinty ground; "wasn’t it Davy that pointed him out to us and the
hair liftin’ from his head six months since?”
“Und you like schwimmin’, yes?” said Swein Poulsson, his face
like the rising sun with the cold.
“Swimmin’, is it?” said Terence, “sure, the divil made worse
things than wather. And Hamilton’s beyant.”
“I reckon that’ll fetch us through,” Bill Cowan put in grimly.
It was a blessed thing that none of us had a bird’s-eye view of
that same water. No man of force will listen when his mind is made
up, and perhaps it is just as well. For in that way things are
accomplished. Clark would not listen to Monsieur Vigo, and hence
the financier had, perforce, to listen to Clark. There were
several miracles before we left. Monsieur Vigo, for instance,
agreed to pay the expenses of the expedition, though in his heart
he thought we should never get to Vincennes. Incidentally, he was
never repaid. Then there were the French — yesterday, running hither
and thither in paroxysms of fear; to-day, enlisting in whole
companies, though it were easier to get to the wild geese of the
swamps than to Hamilton. Their ladies stitched colors day and
night, and presented them with simple confidence to the Colonel in
the church. Twenty stands of colors for 170 men, counting those
who had come from Cahokia. Think of the industry of it, of the
enthusiasm behind it! Twenty stands of colors! Clark took them
all, and in due time it will be told how the colors took
Vincennes. This was because Colonel Clark was a man of destiny.
Furthermore, Colonel Clark was off the next morning at dawn to
buy a Mississippi keel-boat. He had her rigged up with two
four-pounders and four swivels, filled her with provisions, and
called her the Willing. She was the first gunboat on the Western
waters. A great fear came into my heart, and at dusk I stole back
to the Colonel’s house alone. The snow had turned to rain, and
Terence stood guard within the doorway.
“Arrah,” he said, “what ails ye, darlin’?”
I gulped and the tears sprang into my eyes; whereupon Terence,
in defiance of all military laws, laid his gun against the
doorpost and put his arms around me, and I confided my fears. It
was at this critical juncture that the door opened and Colonel
Clark came out.
“What’s to do here?” he demanded, gazing at us sternly.
“Savin’ your Honor’s prisence,” said Terence, “he’s afeard your
Honor will be sending him on the boat. Sure, he wants to go
swimmin’ with the rest of us.”
Colonel Clark frowned, bit his lip, and Terence seized his gun
and stood to attention.
“It were right to leave you in Kaskaskia,” said the Colonel;
"the water will be over your head.”
“The King’s drum would be floatin’ the likes of him,” said the
irrepressible Terence, “and the b’ys would be that lonesome.”
The Colonel walked away without a word. In an hour’s time he
came back to find me cleaning his accoutrements by the fire. For a
while he did not speak, but busied himself with his papers, I
having lighted the candles for him. Presently he spoke my name,
and I stood before him.
“I will give you a piece of advice, Davy,” said he. "If you want
a thing, go straight to the man that has it. McChesney has spoken
to me about this wild notion of yours of going to Vincennes, and
Cowan and McCann and Ray and a dozen others have dogged my
footsteps.”
“I only spoke to Terence because he asked me, sir,” I answered.
"I said nothing to any one else.”
He laid down his pen and looked at me with an odd expression.
“What a weird little piece you are,” he exclaimed; "you seem to
have wormed your way into the hearts of these men. Do you know
that you will probably never get to Vincennes alive?”
“I don’t care, sir,” I said. A happy thought struck me. "If they
see a boy going through the water, sir — " I hesitated, abashed.
“What then?” said Clark, shortly.
“It may keep some from going back,” I finished.
At that he gave a sort of gasp, and stared at me the more.
“Egad,” he said, “I believe the good Lord launched you wrong end
to. Perchance you will be a child when you are fifty.”
He was silent a long time, and fell to musing. And I thought he
had forgotten.
“May I go, sir?” I asked at length.
He started.
“Come here,” said he. But when I was close to him he merely laid
his hand on my shoulder. "Yes, you may go, Davy.”
He sighed, and presently turned to his writing again, and I went
back joyfully to my cleaning.
On a certain dark 4th of February, picture the village of
Kaskaskia assembled on the river-bank in capote and hood. Ropes
are cast off, the keel-boat pushes her blunt nose through the
cold, muddy water, the oars churn up dirty, yellow foam, and
cheers shake the sodden air. So the Willing left on her long
journey: down the Kaskaskia, into the flood of the Mississippi,
against many weary leagues of the Ohio’s current, and up the
swollen Wabash until they were to come to the mouth of the White
River near Vincennes. There they were to await us.
Should we ever see them again? I think that this was the
unspoken question in the hearts of the many who were to go by
land.
The 5th was a mild, gray day, with the melting snow lying in
patches on the brown bluff, and the sun making shift to pierce
here and there. We formed the regiment in the fort, — backwoodsman
and Creole now to fight for their common country, Jacques and
Pierre and Alphonse; and mother and father, sweetheart and wife,
waiting to wave a last good-by. Bravely we marched out of the gate
and into the church for Father Gibault’s blessing. And then,
forming once more, we filed away on the road leading northward to
the ferry, our colors flying, leaving the weeping, cheering crowd
behind. In front of the tall men of the column was a wizened
figure, beating madly on a drum, stepping proudly with head thrown
back. It was Cowan’s voice that snapped the strain.
“Go it, Davy, my little gamecock!” he cried, and the men laughed
and cheered. And so we came to the bleak ferry landing where we
had crossed on that hot July night six months before.
We were soon on the prairies, and in the misty rain that fell
and fell they seemed to melt afar into a gray and cheerless ocean.
The sodden grass was matted now and unkempt. Lifeless lakes filled
the depressions, and through them we waded mile after mile
ankle-deep. There was a little cavalcade mounted on the tiny
French ponies, and sometimes I rode with these; but oftenest Cowan
or Tom would fling me; drum and all, on his shoulder. For we had
reached the forest swamps where the water is the color of the
Creole coffee. And day after day as we marched, the soft rain came
out of the east and wet us to the skin.
It was a journey of torments, and even that first part of it was
enough to discourage the most resolute spirit. Men might be led
through it, but never driven. It is ever the mind which suffers
through the monotonies of bodily discomfort, and none knew this
better than Clark himself. Every morning as we set out with the
wet hide chafing our skin, the Colonel would run the length of the
regiment, crying: —
“Who gives the feast to-night, boys?”
Now it was Bowman’s company, now McCarty’s, now Bayley’s. How
the hunters vied with each other to supply the best, and spent the
days stalking the deer cowering in the wet thickets. We crossed
the Saline, and on the plains beyond was a great black patch, a
herd of buffalo. A party of chosen men headed by Tom McChesney was
sent after them, and never shall I forget the sight of the mad
beasts charging through the water.
That night, when our chilled feet could bear no more, we sought
out a patch of raised ground a little firmer than a quagmire, and
heaped up the beginnings of a fire with such brush as could be
made to burn, robbing the naked thickets. Saddle and steak
sizzled, leather steamed and stiffened, hearts and bodies thawed;
grievances that men had nursed over miles of water melted. Courage
sits best on a full stomach, and as they ate they cared not
whether the Atlantic had opened between them and Vincennes. An
hour agone, and there were twenty cursing laggards, counting the
leagues back to Kaskaskia. Now: —
“C’était un vieux sauvage
Tout noir, tour barbouilla,
Ouich’ ka!
Avec sa vieill’ couverte
Et son sac à tabac.
Ouich’ ka!
Ah! ah! tenaouich’ tenaga,
Tenaouich’ tenaga, ouich’ ka!”
So sang Antoine, dit le Gris, in the pulsing red light. And
when, between the verses, he went through the agonies of a Huron
war-dance, the assembled regiment howled with delight. Some men
know cities and those who dwell in the quarters of cities. But
grizzled Antoine knew the half of a continent, and the manners of
trading and killing of the tribes thereof.
And after Antoine came Gabriel, a marked contrast — Gabriel, five
feet six, and the glare showing but a faint dark line on his
quivering lip. Gabriel was a patriot, — a tribute we must pay to all
of those brave Frenchmen who went with us. Nay, Gabriel had left
at home on his little farm near the village a young wife of a
fortnight. And so his lip quivered as he sang: —
“Petit Rocher de la Haute Montagne,
Je vien finir ici cette campagne!
Ah! doux echos, entendez mes soupirs;
En languissant je vais bientot mouir!”
We had need of gayety after that, and so Bill Cowan sang "Billy
of the Wild Wood,” and Terence McCann wailed an Irish jig,
stamping the water out of the spongy ground amidst storms of
mirth. As he desisted, breathless and panting, he flung me up in
the firelight before the eyes of them all, crying: —
“It’s Davy can bate me!”
“Ay, Davy, Davy!” they shouted, for they were in the mood for
anything. There stood Colonel Clark in the dimmer light of the
background. "We must keep ’em screwed up, Davy,” he had said that
very day.
There came to me on the instant a wild song that my father had
taught me when the liquor held him in dominance. Exhilarated, I
sprang from Terence’s arms to the sodden, bared space, and
methinks I yet hear my shrill, piping note, and see my legs
kicking in the fling of it. There was an uproar, a deeper voice
chimed in, and here was McAndrew flinging his legs with mine: —
“I’ve faught on land, I’ve faught at sea,
At hame I faught my aunty, O;
But I met the deevil and Dundee
On the braes o’ Killiecrankie, O.
An’ ye had been where I had been,
Ye wad na be sae cantie, O;
An’ ye had seen what I ha’e seen
On the braes o’ Killiecrankie, O.”
In the morning Clark himself would be the first off through the
gray rain, laughing and shouting and waving his sword in the air,
and I after him as hard as I could pelt through the mud, beating
the charge on my drum until the war-cries of the regiment drowned
the sound of it. For we were upon a pleasure trip — lest any man
forget, — a pleasure trip amidst stark woods and brown plains
flecked with ponds. So we followed him until we came to a place
where, in summer, two quiet rivers flowed through green
forests — the little Wabashes. And now! Now hickory and maple, oak
and cottonwood, stood shivering in three feet of water on what had
been a league of dry land. We stood dismayed at the crumbling edge
of the hill, and one hundred and seventy pairs of eyes were turned
on Clark. With a mere glance at the running stream high on the
bank and the drowned forest beyond, he turned and faced them.
“I reckon you’ve earned a rest, boys,” he said. "We’ll have
games to-day.”
There were some dozen of the unflinching who needed not to be
amused. Choosing a great poplar, these he set to hollowing out a
pirogue, and himself came among the others and played leap-frog
and the Indian game of ball until night fell. And these, instead
of moping and quarrelling, forgot. That night, as I cooked him a
buffalo steak, he drew near the fire with Bowman.
“For the love of God keep up their spirits, Bowman,” said the
Colonel; "keep up their spirits until we get them across. Once on
the farther hills, they cannot go back.”
Here was a different being from the shouting boy who had led the
games and the war-dance that night in the circle of the blaze.
Tired out, we went to sleep with the ring of the axes in our ears,
and in the morning there were more games while the squad crossed
the river to the drowned neck, built a rough scaffold there, and
notched a trail across it; to the scaffold the baggage was
ferried, and the next morning, bit by bit, the regiment. Even now
the pains shoot through my body when I think of how man after man
plunged waist-deep into the icy water toward the farther branch.
The pirogue was filled with the weak, and in the end of it I was
curled up with my drum.
Heroism is a many-sided thing. It is one matter to fight and
finish, another to endure hell’s tortures hour after hour. All day
they waded with numbed feet vainly searching for a footing in the
slime. Truly, the agony of a brave man is among the greatest of
the world’s tragedies to see. As they splashed onward through the
tree-trunks, many a joke went forth, though lips were drawn and
teeth pounded together. I have not the heart to recall these
jokes, — it would seem a sacrilege. There were quarrels, too, the
men striving to push one another from the easier paths; and deeds
sublime when some straggler clutched at the bole of a tree for
support, and was helped onward through excruciating ways. A dozen
held tremblingly to the pirogue’s gunwale, lest they fall and
drown. One walked ahead with a smile, or else fell back to lend a
helping shoulder to a fainting man.
And there was Tom McChesney. All day long I watched him, and
thanked God that Polly Ann could not see him thus. And yet, how
the pride would have leaped within her! Humor came not easily to
him, but charity and courage and unselfishness he had in
abundance. What he suffered none knew; but through those awful
hours he was always among the stragglers, helping the weak and
despairing when his strength might have taken him far ahead toward
comfort and safety. "I’m all right, Davy,” he would say, in answer
to my look as he passed me. But on his face was written something
that I did not understand.
How the Creole farmers and traders, unused even to the common
ways of woodcraft, endured that fearful day and others that
followed, I know not. And when a tardy justice shall arise and
compel the people of this land to raise a shaft in memory of Clark
and those who followed him, let not the loyalty of the French be
forgotten, though it be not understood.
At eventide came to lurid and disordered brains the knowledge
that the other branch was here. And, mercifully, it was shallower
than the first. Holding his rifle high, with a war-whoop Bill
Cowan plunged into the stream. Unable to contain myself more, I
flung my drum overboard and went after it, and amid shouts and
laughter I was towed across by James Ray.
Colonel Clark stood watching from the bank above, and it was he
who pulled me, bedraggled, to dry land. I ran away to help gather
brush for a fire. As I was heaping this in a pile I heard
something that I should not have heard. Nor ought I to repeat it
now, though I did not need the flames to send the blood tingling
through my body.
“McChesney,” said the Colonel, “we must thank our stars that we
brought the boy along. He has grit, and as good a head as any of
us. I reckon if it hadn’t been for him some of them would have
turned back long ago.”
I saw Tom grinning at the Colonel as gratefully as though he
himself had been praised.
The blaze started, and soon we had a bonfire. Some had not the
strength to hold out the buffalo meat to the fire. Even the
grumblers and mutineers were silent, owing to the ordeal they had
gone through. But presently, when they began to be warmed and fed,
they talked of other trials to be borne. The Embarrass and the big
Wabash, for example. These must be like the sea itself.
“Take the back trail, if ye like,” said Bill Cowan, with a loud
laugh. "I reckon the rest of us kin float to Vincennes on Davy’s
drum.”
But there was no taking the back trail now; and well they knew
it. The games began, the unwilling being forced to play, and
before they fell asleep that night they had taken Vincennes,
scalped the Hair Buyer, and were far on the march to Detroit.
Mercifully, now that their stomachs were full, they had no
worries. Few knew the danger we were in of being cut off by
Hamilton’s roving bands of Indians. There would be no retreat, no
escape, but a fight to the death. And I heard this, and much more
that was spoken of in low tones at the Colonel’s fire far into the
night, of which I never told the rank and file, — not even Tom
McChesney.
On and on, through rain and water, we marched until we drew near
to the river Embarrass. Drew near, did I say? "Sure, darlin’,”
said Terence, staring comically over the gray waste, “we’ve been
in it since Choosd’y.” There was small exaggeration in it. In vain
did our feet seek the deeper water. It would go no higher than our
knees, and the sound which the regiment made in marching was like
that of a great flatboat going against the current. It had been a
sad, lavender-colored day, and now that the gloom of the night was
setting in, and not so much as a hummock showed itself above the
surface, the Creoles began to murmur. And small wonder! Where was
this man leading them, this Clark who had come amongst them from
the skies, as it were? Did he know, himself? Night fell as though
a blanket had been spread over the tree-tops, and above the dreary
splashing men could be heard calling to one another in the
darkness. Nor was there any supper ahead. For our food was gone,
and no game was to be shot over this watery waste. A cold like
that of eternal space settled in our bones. Even Terence McCann
grumbled.
“Begob,” said he, “’tis fine weather for fishes, and the birrds
are that comfortable in the threes. ’Tis no place for a baste at
all, at all.”
Sometime in the night there was a cry. Ray had found the water
falling from an oozy bank, and there we dozed fitfully until we
were startled by a distant boom.
It was Governor Hamilton’s morning gun at Fort Sackville,
Vincennes.
There was no breakfast. How we made our way, benumbed with
hunger and cold, to the banks of the Wabash, I know not. Captain
McCarty’s company was set to making canoes, and the rest of us
looked on apathetically as the huge trees staggered and fell
amidst a fountain of spray in the shallow water. We were but three
leagues from Vincennes. A raft was bound together, and Tom
McChesney and three other scouts sent on a desperate journey
across the river in search of boats and provisions, lest we starve
and fall and die on the wet flats. Before he left Tom came to me,
and the remembrance of his gaunt face haunted me for many years
after. He drew something from his bosom and held it out to me, and
I saw that it was a bit of buffalo steak which he had saved. I
shook my head, and the tears came into my eyes.
“Come, Davy,” he said, “ye’re so little, and I beant hungry.”
Again I shook my head, and for the life of me I could say
nothing.
“I reckon Polly Ann’d never forgive me if anything was to happen
to you,” said he.
At that I grew strangely angry.
“It’s you who need it,” I cried, “it’s you that has to do the
work. And she told me to take care of you.”
The big fellow grinned sheepishly, as was his wont.
“’Tis only a bite,” he pleaded, “’twouldn’t only make me hungry,
and" — he looked hard at me — "and it might be the savin’ of you.
Ye’ll not eat it for Polly Ann’s sake?” he asked coaxingly.
“’Twould not be serving her,” I answered indignantly.
“Ye’re an obstinate little deevil!” he cried, and, dropping the
morsel on the freshly cut stump, he stalked away. I ran after him,
crying out, but he leaped on the raft that was already in the
stream and began to pole across. I slipped the piece into my own
hunting shirt.
All day the men who were too weak to swing axes sat listless on
the bank, watching in vain for some sight of the Willing. They saw
a canoe rounding the bend instead, with a single occupant paddling
madly. And who should this be but Captain Willing’s own brother,
escaped from the fort, where he had been a prisoner. He told us
that a man named Maisonville, with a party of Indians, was in
pursuit of him, and the next piece of news he had was in the way
of raising our despair a little. Governor Hamilton’s astonishment
at seeing this force here and now would be as great as his own.
Governor Hamilton had said, indeed, that only a navy could take
Vincennes this year. Unfortunately, Mr. Willing brought no food.
Next in order came five Frenchmen, trapped by our scouts, nor had
they any provisions. But as long as I live I shall never forget
how Tom McChesney returned at nightfall, the hero of the hour. He
had shot a deer; and never did wolves pick an animal cleaner. They
pressed on me a choice piece of it, these great-hearted men who
were willing to go hungry for the sake of a child, and when I
refused it they would have forced it down my throat. Swein
Poulsson, he that once hid under the bed, deserves a special
tablet to his memory. He was for giving me all he had, though his
little eyes were unnaturally bright and the red had left his
cheeks now.
“He haf no belly, only a leedle on his backbone!” he cried.
“Begob, thin, he has the backbone,” said Terence.
“I have a piece,” said I, and drew forth that which Tom had
given me.
They brought a quarter of a saddle to Colonel Clark, but he
smiled at them kindly and told them to divide it amongst the weak.
He looked at me as I sat with my feet crossed on the stump.
“I will follow Davy’s example,” said he.
At length the canoes were finished and we crossed the river,
swimming over the few miserable skeletons of the French ponies we
had brought along. We came to a sugar camp, and beyond it,
stretching between us and Vincennes, was a sea of water. Here we
made our camp, if camp it could be called. There was no fire, no
food, and the water seeped out of the ground on which we lay. Some
of those even who had not yet spoken now openly said that we could
go no farther. For the wind had shifted into the northwest, and,
for the first time since we had left Kaskaskia we saw the stars
gleaming like scattered diamonds in the sky. Bit by bit the ground
hardened, and if by chance we dozed we stuck to it. Morning found
the men huddled like sheep, their hunting shirts hard as boards,
and long before Hamilton’s gun we were up and stamping. Antoine
poked the butt of his rifle through the ice of the lake in front
of us.
“I think we not get to Vincennes this day,” he said.
Colonel Clark, who heard him, turned to me.
“Fetch McChesney here, Davy,” he said. Tom came.
“McChesney,” said he, “when I give the word, take Davy and his
drum on your shoulders and follow me. And Davy, do you think you
can sing that song you gave us the other night?”
“Oh, yes, sir,” I answered.
Without more ado the Colonel broke the skim of ice, and, taking
some of the water in his hand, poured powder from his flask into
it and rubbed it on his face until he was the color of an Indian.
Stepping back, he raised his sword high in the air, and, shouting
the Shawanee war-whoop, took a flying leap up to his thighs in the
water. Tom swung me instantly to his shoulder and followed, I
beating the charge with all my might, though my hands were so numb
that I could scarce hold the sticks. Strangest of all, to a man
they came shouting after us.
“Now, Davy!” said the Colonel.
“I’ve faught on land, I’ve faught at sea,
At hame I faught my aunty, O;
But I met the deevil and Dundee
On the braes o’ Killiecrankie, O.”
I piped it at the top of my voice, and sure enough the regiment
took up the chorus, for it had a famous swing.
“An’ ye had been where I had been,
Ye wad na be sae cantie, O;
An’ ye had seen what I ha’e seen’
On the braes o’ Killiecrankie, O.”
When their breath was gone we heard Cowan shout that he had
found a path under his feet, — a path that was on dry land in the
summer-time. We followed it, feeling carefully, and at length,
when we had suffered all that we could bear, we stumbled on to a
dry ridge. Here we spent another night of torture, with a second
backwater facing us coated with a full inch of ice.
And still there was nothing to eat.
TO LIE the night on adamant, pierced by the needles of the
frost; to awake shivering and famished, until the meaning of an
inch of ice on the backwater comes to your mind, — these are not
calculated to put a man into an equable mood to listen to oratory.
Nevertheless there was a kind of oratory to fit the case. To
picture the misery of these men is well-nigh impossible. They
stood sluggishly in groups, dazed by suffering, and their faces
were drawn and their eyes ringed, their beards and hair matted.
And many found it in their hearts to curse Clark and that
government for which he fought.
When the red fire of the sun glowed through the bare branches
that morning, it seemed as if the campaign had spent itself like
an arrow which drops at the foot of the mark. Could life and
interest and enthusiasm be infused again in such as these? I have
ceased to marvel how it was done. A man no less haggard than the
rest, but with a compelling force in his eyes, pointed with a
blade to the hills across the river. They must get to them, he
said, and their troubles would be ended. He said more, and they
cheered him. These are the bare facts. He picked a man here, and
another there, and these went silently to a grim duty behind the
regiment.
“If any try to go back, shoot them down!” he cried.
Then with a gun-butt he shattered the ice and was the first to
leap into the water under it. They followed, some with a cheer
that was most pitiful of all. They followed him blindly, as men go
to torture, but they followed him, and the splashing and crushing
of the ice were sounds to freeze my body. I was put in a canoe. In
my day I have beheld great suffering and hardship, and none of it
compared to this. Torn with pity, I saw them reeling through the
water, now grasping trees and bushes to try to keep their feet,
the strongest breaking the way ahead and supporting the weak
between them. More than once Clark himself tottered where he beat
the ice at the apex of the line. Some swooned and would have
drowned had they not been dragged across the canoe and chafed back
to consciousness. By inches the water shallowed. Clark reached the
high ground, and then Bill Cowan, with a man on each shoulder.
Then others endured to the shallows to fall heavily in the
crumbled ice and be dragged out before they died. But at length,
by God’s grace, the whole regiment was on the land. Fires would
not revive some, but Clark himself seized a fainting man by the
arms and walked him up and down in the sunlight until his blood
ran again.
It was a glorious day, a day when the sap ran in the maples, and
the sun soared upwards in a sky of the palest blue. All this we
saw through the tracery of the leafless branches, — a mirthless,
shivering crowd, crept through a hell of weather into the Hair
Buyer’s very lair. Had he neither heard nor seen?
Down the steel-blue lane of water between the ice came a canoe.
Our stunted senses perceived it, unresponsive. A man cried out (it
was Tom McChesney); now some of them had leaped into the pirogue,
now they were returning. In the towed canoe two fat and stolid
squaws and a pappoose were huddled, and beside them — God be
praised! — food. A piece of buffalo on its way to town, and in the
end compartment of the boat tallow and bear’s grease lay revealed
by two blows of the tomahawk. The kettles — long disused — were
fetched, and broth made and fed in sips to the weakest, while the
strongest looked on and smiled in an agony of self-restraint. It
was a fearful thing to see men whose legs had refused service
struggle to their feet when they had drunk the steaming, greasy
mixture. And the Colonel, standing by the river’s edge, turned his
face away — down-stream. And then, as often, I saw the other side of
the man. Suddenly he looked at me, standing wistful at his side.
“They have cursed me,” said he, by way of a question, “they have
cursed me every day.” And seeing me silent, he insisted, “Tell me,
is it not so, Davy?”
“It is so,” I said, wondering that he should pry, “but it was
while they suffered. And — and some refrained.”
“And you?” he asked queerly.
“I — I could not, sir. For I asked leave to come.”
“If they have condemned me to a thousand hells,” said he,
dispassionately, “I should not blame them.” Again he looked at me.
"Do you understand what you have done?” he asked.
“No, sir,” I said uneasily.
“And yet there are some human qualities in you, Davy. You have
been worth more to me than another regiment.”
I stared.
“When you grow older, if you ever do, tell your children that
once upon a time you put a hundred men to shame. It is no small
thing.”
Seeing him relapse into silence, I did not speak. For the space
of half an hour he stared down the river, and I knew that he was
looking vainly for the Willing.
At noon we crossed, piecemeal, a deep lake in the canoes, and
marching awhile came to a timber-covered rise which our French
prisoners named as the Warriors’ Island. And from the shelter of
its trees we saw the steely lines of a score of low ponds, and
over the tops of as many ridges a huddle of brown houses on the
higher ground.
And this was the place we had all but sold our lives to behold!
This was Vincennes at last! We were on the heights behind the
town, — we were at the back door, as it were. At the far side, on
the Wabash River, was the front door, or Fort Sackville, where the
banner of England snapped in the February breeze.
We stood there, looking, as the afternoon light flooded the
plain. Suddenly the silence was broken.
“Hooray for Clark!” cried a man at the edge of the copse.
“Hooray for Clark!” — it was the whole regiment this time. From
execration to exaltation was but a step, after all. And the
Creoles fell to scoffing at their sufferings and even forgot their
hunger in staring at the goal. The backwoodsmen took matters more
stolidly, having acquired long since the art of waiting. They
lounged about, cleaning their guns, watching the myriad flocks of
wild ducks and geese casting blue-black shadows on the ponds.
“Arrah, McChesney,” said Terence, as he watched the circling
birds, “Clark’s a great man, but ’tis more riverince I’d have for
him if wan av thim was sizzling on the end of me ramrod.”
“I’d sooner hev the Ha’r Buyer’s sculp,” said Tom.
Presently there was a drama performed for our delectation. A
shot came down the wind, and we perceived that several innocent
Creole gentlemen, unconscious of what the timber held, were
shooting the ducks and geese. Whereupon Clark chose Antoine and
three of our own Creoles to sally out and shoot likewise — as
decoys. We watched them working their way over the ridges, and
finally saw them coming back with one of the Vincennes sportsmen.
I cannot begin to depict the astonishment of this man when he
reached the copse, and was led before our lean, square-shouldered
commander. Yes, monsieur, he was a friend of
les Américains. Did
Governor Hamilton know that a visit was imminent? Pardieu (with
many shrugs and outward gestures of the palms), Governor Hamilton
had said if the Long Knives had wings or fins they might reach him
now — he was all unprepared.
“Gentlemen,” said Colonel Clark to Captains Bowman and McCarty
and Williams, “we have come so far by audacity, and we must
continue by audacity. It is of no use to wait for the gunboat, and
every moment we run the risk of discovery. I shall write an open
letter to the inhabitants of Vincennes, which the prisoner shall
take into town. I shall tell them that those who are true to the
oath they swore to Father Gibault shall not be molested if they
remain quietly in their houses. Let those who are on the side of
the Hair Buyer General and his King go to the fort and fight
there.”
He bade me fetch the portfolio he carried, and with numbed
fingers wrote the letter while his captains stared in admiration
and amazement. What a stroke was this! There were six hundred men
in the town and fort, — soldiers, inhabitants, and Indians, — while we
had but 170, starved and weakened by their incredible march. But
Clark was not to be daunted. Whipping out his field-glasses, he
took a stand on a little mound under the trees and followed the
fast-galloping messenger across the plain; saw him enter the town;
saw the stir in the streets, knots of men riding out and gazing,
hands on foreheads, towards the place where we were. But, as the
minutes rolled into hours, there was no further alarm. No gun, no
beat to quarters or bugle-call from Fort Sackville. What could it
mean?
Clark’s next move was an enigma, for he set the men to cutting
and trimming tall sapling poles. To these were tied (how
reverently!) the twenty stands of colors which loving Creole hands
had stitched. The boisterous day was reddening to its close as the
Colonel lined his little army in front of the wood, and we covered
the space of four thousand. For the men were twenty feet apart and
every tenth carried a standard. Suddenly we were aghast as the
full meaning of the inspiration dawned upon us. The command was
given, and we started on our march toward Vincennes. But not
straight, — zigzagging, always keeping the ridges between us and the
town, and to the watching inhabitants it seemed as if thousands
were coming to crush them. Night fell, the colors were furled and
the saplings dropped, and we pressed into serried ranks and
marched straight over hill and dale for the lights that were
beginning to twinkle ahead of us.
We halted once more, a quarter of a mile away. Clark himself had
picked fourteen men to go under Lieutenant Bayley through the town
and take the fort from the other side. Here was audacity with a
vengeance. You may be sure that Tom and Cowan and Ray were among
these, and I trotted after them with the drum banging against my
thighs.
Was ever stronghold taken thus?
They went right into the town, the fourteen of them, into the
main street that led directly to the fort. The simple citizens
gave back, stupefied, at sight of the tall, striding forms.
Muffled Indians stood like statues as we passed, but these raised
not a hand against us. Where were Hamilton, Hamilton’s soldiers
and savages? It was as if we had come a-trading.
The street rose and fell in waves, like the prairie over which
it ran. As we climbed a ridge, here was a little log church, the
rude cross on the belfry showing dark against the sky. And there,
in front of us, flanked by blockhouses with conical caps, was the
frowning mass of Fort Sackville.
“Take cover,” said Williams, hoarsely. It seemed incredible.
The men spread hither and thither, some at the corners of the
church, some behind the fences of the little gardens. Tom chose a
great forest tree that had been left standing, and I went with
him. He powdered his pan, and I laid down my drum beside the tree,
and then, with an impulse that was rare, Tom seized me by the
collar and drew me to him.
“Davy,” he whispered, and I pinched him. "Davy, I reckon Polly
Ann’d be kinder surprised if she knew where we was. Eh?”
I nodded. It seemed strange, indeed, to be talking thus at such
a place. Life has taught me since that it was not so strange, for
however a man may strive and suffer for an object, he usually sits
quiet at the consummation. Here we were in the door-yard of a
peaceful cabin, the ground frozen in lumps under our feet, and it
seemed to me that the wind had something to do with the lightness
of the night.
“Davy,” whispered Tom again, “how’d ye like to see the little
feller to home?”
I pinched him again, and harder this time, for I was at a loss
for adequate words. The muscles of his legs were as hard as the
strands of a rope, and his buckskin breeches frozen so that they
cracked under my fingers.
Suddenly a flickering light arose ahead of us, and another, and
we saw that they were candles beginning to twinkle through the
palings of the fort. These were badly set, the width of a man’s
hand apart. Presently here comes a soldier with a torch, and as he
walked we could see from crack to crack his bluff face all
reddened by the light, and so near were we that we heard the words
of his song: —
“O, there came a lass to Sudbury Fair,
With a hey, and a ho, nonny-nonny!
And she had a rose in her raven hair,
With a hey, and a ho, nonny-nonny!”
“By the etarnal!” said Tom, following the man along the palings
with the muzzle of his Deckard, “by the etarnal! ’tis like
shootin’ beef.”
A gust of laughter came from somewhere beyond. The burly soldier
paused at the foot of the blockhouse.
“Hi, Jem, have ye seen the General’s man? His Honor’s in a ’igh
temper, I warrant ye.”
It was fortunate for Jem that he put his foot inside the
blockhouse door.
“Now, boys!”
It was Williams’s voice, and fourteen rifles sputtered out a
ragged volley.
There was an instant’s silence, and then a score of voices
raised in consternation, — shouting, cursing, commanding. Heavy feet
pounded on the platform of the blockhouse. While Tom was savagely
jamming in powder and ball, the wicket gate of the fort opened, a
man came out and ran to a house a biscuit’s throw away, and ran
back again before he was shot at, slamming the gate after him. Tom
swore.
“We’ve got but the ten rounds,” he said, dropping his rifle to
his knee. "I reckon ’tis no use to waste it.”
“The Willing may come to-night,” I answered.
There was a bugle winding a strange call, and the roll of a
drum, and the running continued.
“Don’t fire till you’re sure, boys,” said Captain Williams.
Our eyes caught sight of a form in the blockhouse port, there
was an instant when a candle flung its rays upon a cannon’s flank,
and Tom’s rifle spat a rod of flame. A red blot hid the cannon’s
mouth, and behind it a man staggered and fell on the candle, while
the shot crunched its way through the logs of the cottage in the
yard where we stood. And now the battle was on in earnest, fire
darting here and there from the black wall, bullets whistling and
flying wide, and at intervals cannon belching, their shot grinding
through trees and houses. But our men waited until the gunners lit
their matches in the cannon-ports, — it was no trick for a
backwoodsman.
At length there came a popping right and left, and we knew that
Bowman and McCarty’s men had swung into position there.
An hour passed, and a shadow came along our line, darting from
cover to cover. It was Lieutenant Bayley, and he sent me back to
find the Colonel and to tell him that the men had but a few rounds
left. I sped through the streets on the errand, spied a Creole
company waiting in reserve, and near them, behind a warehouse, a
knot of backwoodsmen, French, and Indians, lighted up by a smoking
torch. And here was Colonel Clark talking to a big, blanketed
chief. I was hovering around the skirts of the crowd and seeking
for an opening, when a hand pulled me off my feet.
“What’ll ye be afther now?” said a voice, which was Terence’s.
“Let me go,” I cried, “I have a message from Lieutenant Bayley.”
“Sure,” said Terence, “a man’d think ye had the Hair Buyer’s
sculp in yere pocket. The Colonel is treaty-makin’ with Tobacey’s
Son, the grreatest Injun in these parrts.”
“I don’t care.”
“Hist!” said Terence.
“Let me go,” I yelled, so loudly that the Colonel turned, and
Terence dropped me like a live coal. I wormed my way to where
Clark stood. Tobacco’s Son was at that moment protesting that the
Big Knives were his brothers, and declaring that before morning
broke he would have one hundred warriors for the Great White
Chief. Had he not made a treaty of peace with Captain Helm, who
was even then a prisoner of the British general in the fort?
Colonel Clark replied that he knew well of the fidelity of
Tobacco’s Son to the Big Knives, that Tobacco’s Son had remained
stanch in the face of bribes and presents (this was true). Now all
that Colonel Clark desired of Tobacco’s Son besides his friendship
was that he would keep his warriors from battle. The Big Knives
would fight their own fight. To this sentiment Tobacco’s Son
grunted extreme approval. Colonel Clark turned to me.
“What is it, Davy?” he asked.
I told him.
“Tobacco’s Son has dug up for us King George’s ammunition,” he
said. "Go tell Lieutenant Bayley that I will send him enough to
last him a month.”
I sped away with the message. Presently I came back again, upon
another message, and they were eating, — those reserves, — they were
eating as I had never seen men eat but once, at Kaskaskia. The
baker stood by with lifted palms, imploring the saints that he
might have some compensation, until Clark sent him back to his
shop to knead and bake again. The good Creoles approached the
fires with the contents of their larders in their hands. Terence
tossed me a loaf the size of a cannon ball, and another.
“Fetch that wan to wan av the b’ys,” said he.
I seized as much as my arms could hold and scurried away to the
firing line once more, and, heedless of whistling bullets, darted
from man to man until the bread was exhausted. Not a one but gave
me a "God bless you, Davy,” ere he seized it with a great hand and
began to eat in wolfish bites, his Deckard always on the watch the
while.
There was no sleep in the village. All night long, while the
rifles sputtered, the villagers in their capotes — men, women, and
children — huddled around the fires. The young men of the militia
begged Clark to allow them to fight, and to keep them well
affected he sent some here and there amongst our lines. For our
Colonel’s strength was not counted by rifles or men alone: he
fought with his brain. As Hamilton, the Hair Buyer, made his
rounds, he believed the town to be in possession of a horde of
Kentuckians. Shouts, war-whoops, and bursts of laughter went up
from behind the town. Surely a great force was there, a small part
of which had been sent to play with him and his men. On the
fighting line, when there was a lull, our backwoodsmen stood up
behind their trees and cursed the enemy roundly, and often by
these taunts persuaded the furious gunners to open their ports and
fire their cannon. Woe be to him that showed an arm or a shoulder!
Though a casement be lifted ever so warily, a dozen balls would
fly into it. And at length, when some of the besieged had died in
their anger, the ports were opened no more. It was then our
sharpshooters crept up boldly to within thirty yards of them — nay,
it seemed as if they lay under the very walls of the fort. And
through the night the figure of the Colonel himself was often seen
amongst them, praising their markmanship, pleading with every man
not to expose himself without cause. He spied me where I had
wormed myself behind the foot-board of a picket fence beneath the
cannon-port of a blockhouse. It was during one of the breathing
spaces.
“What’s this?” said he to Cowan, sharply, feeling me with his
foot.
“I reckon it’s Davy, sir,” said my friend, somewhat sheepishly.
"We can’t do nothin’ with him. He’s been up and down the line
twenty times this night.”
“What doing?” says the Colonel.
“Bread and powder and bullets,” answered Bill.
“But that’s all over,” says Clark.
“He’s the very devil to pry,” answered Bill. "The first we know
he’ll be into the fort under the logs.”
“Or between them,” says Clark, with a glance at the open
palings. "Come here, Davy.”
I followed him, dodging between the houses, and when we had got
off the line he took me by the two shoulders from behind.
“You little rascal,” said he, shaking me, “how am I to look out
for an army and you besides? Have you had anything to eat?”
“Yes, sir,” I answered.
We came to the fires, and Captain Bowman hurried up to meet him.
“We’re piling up earthworks and barricades,” said the Captain,
"for the fight to-morrow. My God! if the Willing would only come,
we could put our cannon into them.”
Clark laughed.
“Bowman,” said he, kindly, “has Davy fed you yet?”
“No,” says the Captain, surprised, “I’ve had no time to eat.”
“He seems to have fed the whole army,” said the Colonel. He
paused. "Have they scented Lamothe or Maisonville?”
“Devil a scent!” cried the Captain, “and we’ve scoured wood and
quagmire. They tell me that Lamothe has a very pretty force of
redskins at his heels.”
“Let McChesney go,” said Clark sharply, “McChesney and Ray. I’ll
warrant they can find ’em.”
Now I knew that Maisonville had gone out a-chasing Captain
Willing’s brother, — he who had run into our arms. Lamothe was a
noted Indian partisan and a dangerous man to be dogging our rear
that night. Suddenly there came a thought that took my breath and
set my heart a-hammering. When the Colonel’s back was turned I
slipped away beyond the range of the firelight, and I was soon on
the prairie, stumbling over hummocks and floundering into ponds,
yet going as quietly as I could, turning now and again to look
back at the distant glow or to listen to the rifles popping around
the fort. The night was cloudy and pitchy dark. Twice the whirring
of startled waterfowl frightened me out of my senses, but ambition
pricked me on in spite of fear. I may have gone a mile thus,
perchance two or three, straining every sense, when a sound
brought me to a stand. At first I could not distinguish it because
of my heavy breathing, but presently I made sure that it was the
low drone of human voices. Getting down on my hands and knees, I
crept forward, and felt the ground rising. The voices had ceased.
I gained the crest of a low ridge, and threw myself flat. A rattle
of musketry set me shivering, and in an agony of fright I looked
behind me to discover that I could not be more than four hundred
yards from the fort. I had made a circle. I lay very still, my
eyes watered with staring, and then — the droning began again. I
went forward an inch, then another and another down the slope, and
at last I could have sworn that I saw dark blurs against the
ground. I put out my hand, my weight went after, and I had crashed
through a coating of ice up to my elbow in a pool. There came a
second of sheer terror, a hoarse challenge in French, and then I
took to my heels and flew towards the fort at the top of my speed.
I heard them coming after me, leap and bound, and crying out to
one another. Ahead of me there might have been a floor or a
precipice, as the ground looks level at night. I hurt my foot
cruelly on a frozen clod of earth, slid down the washed bank of a
run into the Wabash, picked myself up, scrambled to the top of the
far side, and had gotten away again when my pursuer shattered the
ice behind me. A hundred yards more, two figures loomed up in
front, and I was pulled up choking.
“Hang to him, Fletcher!” said a voice.
“Great God!” cried Fletcher, “it’s Davy. What are ye up to now?”
“Let me go!” I cried, as soon as I had got my wind. As luck
would have it, I had run into a pair of daredevil young
Kentuckians who had more than once tasted the severity of Clark’s
discipline, — Fletcher Blount and Jim Willis. They fairly shook out
of me what had happened, and then dropped me with a war-whoop and
started for the prairie, I after them, crying out to them to
beware of the run. A man must indeed be fleet of foot to have
escaped these young ruffians, and so it proved. When I reached the
hollow there were the two of them fighting with a man in the
water, the ice jangling as they shifted their feet.
“What’s yere name?” said Fletcher, cuffing and kicking his
prisoner until he cried out for mercy.
“Maisonville,” said the man, whereupon Fletcher gave a war-whoop
and kicked him again.
“That’s no way to use a prisoner,” said I, hotly.
“Hold your mouth, Davy,” said Fletcher, “you didn’t ketch him.”
“You wouldn’t have had him but for me,” I retorted.
Fletcher’s answer was an oath. They put Maisonville between
them, ran him through the town up to the firing line, and there,
to my horror, they tied him to a post and used him for a shield,
despite his heart-rending yells. In mortal fear that the poor man
would be shot down, I was running away to find some one who might
have influence over them when I met a lieutenant. He came up and
ordered them angrily to unbind Maisonville and bring him before
the Colonel. Fletcher laughed, whipped out his hunting knife, and
cut the thongs; but he and Willis had scarce got twenty paces from
the officer before they seized poor Maisonville by the hair and
made shift to scalp him. This was merely backwoods play, had
Maisonville but known it. Persuaded, however, that his last hour
was come, he made a desperate effort to clear himself, whereupon
Fletcher cut off a piece of his skin by mistake. Maisonville,
making sure that he had been scalped, stood groaning and clapping
his hand to his head, while the two young rascals drew back and
stared at each other.
“What’s to do now?” said Willis.
“Take our medicine, I reckon,” answered Fletcher, grimly. And
they seized the tottering man between them, and marched him
straightway to the fire where Clark stood.
They had seen the Colonel angry before, but now they were fairly
withered under his wrath. And he could have given them no greater
punishment, for he took them from the firing line, and sent them
back to wait among the reserves until the morning.
“Nom de Dieu!” said Maisonville, wrathfully, as he watched them
go, “they should hang.”
“The stuff that brought them here through ice and flood is apt
to boil over, Captain,” remarked the Colonel, dryly.
“If you please, sir,” said I, “they did not mean to cut him, but
he wriggled.”
Clark turned sharply.
“Eh?” said he, “did you have a hand in this, too?”
“Peste!” cried the Captain, “the little ferret — you call him — he
find me on the prairie. I run to catch him with some men and fall
into the crick — " he pointed to his soaked leggings, “and your
demons, they fall on top of me.”
“I wish to heaven you had caught Lamothe instead, Davy,” said
the Colonel, and joined despite himself in the laugh that went up.
Falling sober again, he began to question the prisoner. Where was
Lamothe? Pardieu, Maisonville could not say. How many men did he
have, etc., etc.? The circle about us deepened with eager
listeners, who uttered exclamations when Maisonville, between his
answers, put up his hand to his bleeding head. Suddenly the circle
parted, and Captain Bowman came through.
“Ray has discovered Lamothe, sir,” said he. "What shall we do?”
“Let him into the fort,” said Clark, instantly.
There was a murmur of astonished protest.
“Let him into the fort!” exclaimed Bowman.
“Certainly,” said the Colonel; "if he finds he cannot get in, he
will be off before the dawn to assemble the tribes.”
“But the fort is provisioned for a month,” Bowman expostulated;
"and they must find out to-morrow how weak we are.”
“To-morrow will be too late,” said Clark.
“And suppose he shouldn’t go in?”
“He will go in,” said the Colonel, quietly. "Withdraw your men,
Captain, from the north side.”
Captain Bowman departed. Whatever he may have thought of these
orders, he was too faithful a friend of the Colonel’s to delay
their execution. Murmuring, swearing oaths of astonishment, man
after man on the firing line dropped his rifle at the word, and
sullenly retreated. The crack, crack of the Deckards on the south
and east were stilled; not a barrel was thrust by the weary
garrison through the logs, and the place became silent as the
wilderness. It was the long hour before the dawn. And as we lay
waiting on the hard ground, stiff and cold and hungry, talking in
whispers, somewhere near six of the clock on that February morning
the great square of Fort Sackville began to take shape. There was
the long line of the stockade, the projecting blockhouses at each
corner with peaked caps, and a higher capped square tower from the
centre of the enclosure, the banner of England drooping there and
clinging forlorn to its staff, as though with a presentiment.
Then, as the light grew, the close-lipped casements were seen,
scarred with our bullets. The little log houses of the town came
out, the sapling palings and the bare trees, — all grim and gaunt at
that cruel season. Cattle lowed here and there, and horses
whinnied to be fed.
It was a dirty, gray dawn, and we waited until it had done its
best. From where we lay hid behind log house and palings we
strained our eyes towards the prairie to see if Lamothe would take
the bait, until our view was ended at the fuzzy top of a hillock.
Bill Cowan, doubled up behind a woodpile and breathing heavily,
nudged me.
“Davy, Davy, what d’ye see!”
Was it a head that broke the line of the crest? Even as I
stared, breathless, half a score of forms shot up and were running
madly for the stockade. Twenty more broke after them, Indians and
Frenchmen, dodging, swaying, crowding, looking fearfully to right
and left. And from within the fort came forth a hubbub, — cries and
scuffling, orders, oaths, and shouts. In plain view of our
impatient Deckards soldiers manned the platform, and we saw that
they were flinging down ladders. An officer in a faded scarlet
coat stood out among the rest, shouting himself hoarse.
Involuntarily Cowan lined his sights across the woodpile on this
mark of color.
Lamothe’s men, a seething mass, were fighting like wolves for
the ladders, fearful yet that a volley might kill half of them
where they stood. And so fast did they scramble upwards that the
men before them stepped on their fingers. All at once and by
acclamation the fierce war-whoops of our men rent the air, and
some toppled in sheer terror and fell the twelve feet of the
stockade at the sound of it. Then every man in the regiment,
Creole and backwoodsman, lay back to laugh. The answer of the
garrison was a defiant cheer, and those who had dropped, finding
they were not shot at, picked themselves up again and gained the
top, helping to pull the ladders after them. Bowman’s men swung
back into place, the rattle and drag were heard in the blockhouse
as the cannon were run out through the ports, and the battle which
had held through the night watches began again with redoubled
vigor. But there was more caution on the side of the British, for
they had learned dearly how the Kentuckians could measure crack
and crevice.
There followed two hours and a futile waste of ammunition, the
lead from the garrison flying harmless here and there, and not a
patch of skin or cloth showing.
“IF I am obliged to storm, you may depend upon such treatment as
is justly due to a murderer. And beware of destroying stores of
any kind, or any papers or letters that are in your possession; or
of hurting one house in the town. For, by Heaven! if you do, there
shall be no mercy shown you.
“To Lieutenant-Governor Hamilton.”
So read Colonel Clark, as he stood before the log fire in
Monsieur Bouton’s house at the back of the town, the captains
grouped in front of him.
“Is that strong enough, gentlemen?” he asked.
“To raise his hair,” said Captain Charleville.
Captain Bowman laughed loudly.
“I reckon the boys will see to that,” said he.
Colonel Clark folded the letter, addressed it, and turned
gravely to Monsieur Bouton.
“You will oblige me, sir,” said he, “by taking this to Governor
Hamilton. You will be provided with a flag of truce.”
Monsieur Bouton was a round little man, as his name suggested,
and the men cheered him as he strode soberly up the street, a
piece of sheeting tied to a sapling and flung over his shoulder.
Through such humble agencies are the ends of Providence
accomplished. Monsieur Bouton walked up to the gate, disappeared
sidewise through the postern, and we sat down to breakfast. In a
very short time Monsieur Bouton was seen coming back, and his face
was not so impassive that the governors message could not be read
thereon.
“’Tis not a love-letter he has, I’ll warrant,” said Terence, as
the little man disappeared into the house. So accurately had
Monsieur Bouton’s face betrayed the news that the men went back to
their posts without orders, some with half a breakfast in hand.
And soon the rank and file had the message.
“Lieutenant-Governor Hamilton begs leave to acquaint Colonel
Clark that he and his garrison are not disposed to be awed into
any action unworthy of British subjects.”
Our men had eaten, their enemy was within their grasp and Clark
and all his officers could scarce keep them from storming. Such
was the deadliness of their aim that scarce a shot came back, and
time and again I saw men fling themselves in front of the
breastworks with a war-whoop, wave their rifles in the air, and
cry out that they would have the Ha’r Buyer’s sculp before night
should fall. It could not last. Not tuned to the nicer courtesies
of warfare, the memory of Hamilton’s war parties, of blackened
homes, of families dead and missing, raged unappeased. These were
not content to leave vengeance in the Lord’s hands, and when a
white flag peeped timorously above the gate a great yell of
derision went up from river-bank to river-bank. Out of the postern
stepped the officer with the faded scarlet coat, and in due time
went back again, haughtily, his head high, casting contempt right
and left of him. Again the postern opened, and this time there was
a cheer at sight of a man in hunting shirt and leggings and
coonskin cap. After him came a certain Major Hay, Indian-enticer
of detested memory, the lieutenant of him who followed — the Hair
Buyer himself. A murmur of hatred arose from the men stationed
there; and many would have shot him where he stood but for Clark.
“The devil has the grit,” said Cowan, though his eyes blazed.
It was the involuntary tribute. Lieutenant-Governor Hamilton
stared indifferently at the glowering backwoodsmen as he walked
the few steps to the church. Not so Major Hay. His eyes fell.
There was Colonel Clark waiting at the door through which the good
Creoles had been wont to go to worship, bowing somewhat ironically
to the British General. It was a strange meeting they had in St.
Xavier’s, by the light of the candles on the altar. Hot words
passed in that house of peace, the General demanding protection
for all his men, and our Colonel replying that he would do with
the Indian partisans as he chose.
“And whom mean you by Indian partisans?” the undaunted governor
had demanded.
“I take Major Hay to be one of them,” our Colonel had answered.
It was soon a matter of common report how Clark had gazed
fixedly at the Major when he said this, and how the Major turned
pale and trembled. With our own eyes we saw them coming out, Major
Hay as near to staggering as a man could be, the governor blushing
red for shame of him. So they went sorrowfully back to the gate.
Colonel Clark stood at the steps of the church, looking after
them.
“What was that firing?” he demanded sharply. "I gave orders for
a truce.”
We who stood by the church had indeed heard firing in the
direction of the hills east of the town, and had wondered thereat.
Perceiving a crowd gathered at the far end of the street, we all
ran thither save the Colonel, who directed to have the offenders
brought to him at Monsieur Bouton’s. We met the news halfway. A
party of Canadians and Indians had just returned from the Falls of
the Ohio with scalps they had taken. Captain Williams had gone out
with his company to meet them, had lured them on, and finally had
killed a number and was returning with the prisoners. Yes, here
they were! Williams himself walked ahead with two dishevelled and
frightened coureurs du bois, twoscore at least of the townspeople
of Vincennes, friends and relatives of the prisoners, pressing
about and crying out to Williams to have mercy on them. As for
Williams, he took them in to the Colonel, the townspeople pressing
into the door-yard and banking in front of it on the street.
Behind all a tragedy impended, nor can I think of it now without
sickening.
The frightened Creoles in the street gave back against the
fence, and from behind them, issuing as a storm-cloud came the
half of Williams’ company, yelling like madmen. Pushed and jostled
ahead of them were four Indians decked and feathered, the
half-dried scalps dangling from their belts, impassive, true to
their creed despite the indignity of jolts and jars and blows. On
and on pressed the mob, gathering recruits at every corner, and
when they reached St. Xavier’s before the fort half the regiment
was there. Others watched, too, from the stockade, and what they
saw made their knees smite together with fear. Here were four
bronzed statues in a row across the street, the space in front of
them clear that their partisans in the fort might look and
consider. What was passing in the savage mind no man might know.
Not a lip trembled nor an eye faltered when a backwoodsman, his
memory aflame at sight of the pitiful white scalps on their belts,
thrust through the crowd to curse them. Fletcher Blount, frenzied,
snatched his tomahawk from his side.
“Sink, varmint!” he cried with a great oath. "By the etarnal!
we’ll pay the H’ar Buyer in his own coin. Sound your drums!” he
shouted at the fort. "Call the garrison fer the show.”
He had raised his arm and turned to strike when the savage put
up his hand, not in entreaty, but as one man demanding a right
from another. The cries, the curses, the murmurs even, were
hushed. Throwing back his head, arching his chest, the notes of a
song rose in the heavy air. Wild, strange notes they were, that
struck vibrant chords in my own quivering being, and the song was
the death-song. Ay, and the life-song of a soul which had come
into the world even as mine own. And somewhere there lay in the
song, half revealed, the awful mystery of that Creator Whom the
soul leaped forth to meet: the myriad green of the sun playing
with the leaves, the fish swimming lazily in the brown pool, the
doe grazing in the thicket, and a naked boy as free from care as
these; and still the life grows brighter as strength comes, and
stature, and power over man and beast; and then, God knows what
memories of fierce love and fiercer wars and triumphs, of desires
gained and enemies conquered, — God, who has made all lives akin to
something which He holds in the hollow of His hand; and then — the
rain beating on the forest crown, beating, beating, beating.
The song ceased. The Indian knelt in the black mud, not at the
feet of Fletcher Blount, but on the threshold of the Great Spirit
who ruleth all things. The axe fell, yet he uttered no cry as he
went before his Master.
So the four sang, each in turn, and died in the sight of some
who pitied, and some who feared, and some who hated, for the sake
of land and women. So the four went beyond the power of gold and
gewgaw, and were dragged in the mire around the walls and flung
into the yellow waters of the river.
Through the dreary afternoon the men lounged about and cursed
the parley, and hearkened for the tattoo, — the signal agreed upon
by the leaders to begin the fighting. There had been no command
against taunts and jeers, and they gathered in groups under the
walls to indulge themselves, and even tried to bribe me as I sat
braced against a house with my drum between my knees and the
sticks clutched tightly in my hands.
“Here’s a Spanish dollar for a couple o’ taps, Davy,” shouted
Jack Terrell.
“Come on, ye pack of Rebel cutthroats!” yelled a man on the
wall.
He was answered by a torrent of imprecations. And so they flung
it back and forth until nightfall, when out comes the same
faded-scarlet officer, holding a letter in his hand, and marches
down the street to Monsieur Bouton’s. There would be no storming
now, nor any man suffered to lay fingers on the Hair Buyer.
I remember, in particular, Hamilton the Hair Buyer. Not the
fiend my imagination had depicted (I have since learned that most
villains do not look the part), but a man with a great sorrow
stamped upon his face. The sun rose on that 25th of February, and
the mud melted, and one of our companies drew up on each side of
the gate. Downward slid the lion of England, the garrison drums
beat a dirge, and the Hair Buyer marched out at the head of his
motley troops.
Then came my own greatest hour. All morning I had been polishing
and tightening the drum, and my pride was so great as we fell into
line that so much as a smile could not be got out of me. Picture
it all: Vincennes in black and white by reason of the bright day;
eaves and gables, stockade line and capped towers, sharply drawn,
and straight above these a stark flagstaff waiting for our colors;
pigs and fowls straying hither and thither, unmindful that this
day is red on the calendar. Ah! here is a bit of color, too, — the
villagers on the side streets to see the spectacle. Gay wools and
gayer handkerchiefs there, amid the joyous, cheering crowd of
thrice-changed nationality.
“Vive les Bostonnais! Vive les Américains! Vive Monsieur le
Colonel Clark! Vive le petit tambour!”
“Vive le petit tambour!” That was the drummer boy, stepping
proudly behind the Colonel himself, with a soul lifted high above
mire and puddle into the blue above. There was laughter amongst
the giants behind me, and Cowan saying softly, as when we left
Kaskaskia, “Go it, Davy, my little gamecock!” And the whisper of
it was repeated among the ranks drawn up by the gate.
Yes, here was the gate, and now we were in the fort, and an
empire was gained, never to be lost again. The Stars and Stripes
climbed the staff, and the folds were caught by an eager breeze.
Thirteen cannon thundered from the blockhouses — one for each colony
that had braved a king.
There, in the miry square within the Vincennes fort, thin and
bronzed and travel-stained, were the men who had dared the
wilderness in ugliest mood. And yet none by himself would have
done it — each had come here compelled by a spirit stronger than his
own, by a master mind that laughed at the body and its ailments.
Colonel George Rogers Clark stood in the centre of the square,
under the flag to whose renown he had added three stars. Straight
he was, and square, and self-contained. No weakening tremor of
exultation softened his face as he looked upon the men by whose
endurance he had been able to do this thing. He waited until the
white smoke of the last gun had drifted away on the breeze, until
the snapping of the flag and the distant village sounds alone
broke the stillness.
“We have not suffered all things for a reward,” he said, “but
because a righteous cause may grow. And though our names may be
forgotten, our deeds will be remembered. We have conquered a vast
land that our children and our children’s children may be freed
from tyranny, and we have brought a just vengeance upon our
enemies. I thank you, one and all, in the name of the Continental
Congress and of that Commonwealth of Virginia for which you have
fought. You are no longer Virginians, Kentuckians, Kaskaskians,
and Cahokians — you are Americans.”
He paused, and we were silent. Though his words moved us
strongly, they were beyond us.
“I mention no deeds of heroism, of unselfishness, of lives saved
at the peril of others. But I am the debtor of every man here for
the years to come to see that he and his family have justice from
the Commonwealth and the nation.”
Again he stopped, and it seemed to us watching that he smiled a
little.
“I shall name one,” he said, “one who never lagged, who never
complained, who starved that the weak might be fed and walk. David
Ritchie, come here.”
I trembled, my teeth chattered as the water had never made them
chatter. I believe I should have fallen but for Tom, who reached
out from the ranks. I stumbled forward in a daze to where the
Colonel stood, and the cheering from the ranks was a thing beyond
me. The Colonel’s hand on my head brought me to my senses.
“David Ritchie,” he said, “I give you publicly the thanks of the
regiment. The parade is dismissed.”
The next thing I knew I was on Cowan’s shoulders, and he was
tearing round and round the fort with two companies at his heels.
“The divil,” said Terence McCann, “he dhrummed us over the
wather, an’ through the wather; and faix, he would have dhrummed
the sculp from Hamilton’s head and the Colonel had said the
worrd.”
“By gar!” cried Antoine le Gris, “now he drum us on to Detroit.”
Out of the gate rushed Cowan, the frightened villagers
scattering right and left. Antoine had a friend who lived in this
street, and in ten minutes there was rum in the powder-horns, and
the toast was "On to Detroit!”
Colonel Clark was sitting alone in the commanding officer’s room
of the garrison. And the afternoon sun, slanting through the
square of the window, fell upon the maps and papers before him. He
had sent for me. I halted in sheer embarrassment on the threshold,
looked up at his face, and came on, troubled.
“Davy,” he said, “do you want to go back to Kentucky?”
“I should like to stay to the end, Colonel,” I answered.
“The end?” he said. "This is the end.”
“And Detroit, sir?” I returned.
“Detroit!” he cried bitterly, “a man of sense measures his
force, and does not try the impossible. I could as soon march
against Philadelphia. This is the end, I say; and the general must
give way to the politician. And may God have mercy on the
politician who will try to keep a people’s affection without money
or help from Congress.”
He fell back wearily in his chair, while I stood astonished,
wondering. I had thought to find him elated with victory.
“Congress or Virginia,” said he, “will have to pay Monsieur
Vigo, and Father Gibault, and Monsieur Gratiot, and the other good
people who have trusted me. Do you think they will do so?”
“The Congress are far from here,” I said.
“Ay,” he answered, “too far to care about you and me, and what
we have suffered.”
He ended abruptly, and sat for a while staring out of the window
at the figures crossing and recrossing the muddy parade-ground.
“Tom McChesney goes to-night to Kentucky with letters to the
county lieutenant. You are to go with him, and then I shall have
no one to remind me when I am hungry, and bring me hominy. I shall
have no financier, no strategist for a tight place.” He smiled a
little, sadly, at my sorrowful look, and then drew me to him and
patted my shoulder. "It is no place for a young lad, — an idle
garrison. I think,” he continued presently, “I think you have a
future, David, if you do not lose your head. Kentucky will grow
and conquer, and in twenty years be a thriving community. And
presently you will go to Virginia, and study law, and come back
again. Do you hear?”
“Yes, Colonel.”
“And I would tell you one thing,” said he, with force; "serve
the people, as all true men should in a republic. But do not rely
upon their gratitude. You will remember that?”
“Yes, Colonel.”
A long time he paused, looking on me with a significance I did
not then understand. And when he spoke again his voice showed no
trace of emotion, save in the note of it.
“You have been a faithful friend, Davy, when I needed loyalty.
Perhaps the time may come again. Promise me that you will not
forget me if I am — unfortunate.”
“Unfortunate, sir!” I exclaimed.
“Good-by, Davy,” he said, “and God bless you. I have work to
do.”
Still I hesitated. He stared at me, but with kindness.
“What is it, Davy?” he asked.
“Please, sir,” I said, “if I might take my drum?”
At that he laughed.
“You may,” said he, “you may. Perchance we may need it again.”
I went out from his presence, vaguely troubled, to find Tom. And
before the early sun had set we were gliding down the Wabash in a
canoe, past places forever dedicated to our agonies, towards
Kentucky and Polly Ann.
“Davy,” said Tom, “I reckon she’ll be standin’ under the ’simmon
tree, waitin’ fer us with the little shaver in her arms.”
And so she was.
BOOK II.
flotsam and jetsam
THE EDEN of one man may be the Inferno of his neighbor, and now
I am to throw to the winds, like leaves of a worthless manuscript,
some years of time, and introduce you to a new Kentucky, — a
Kentucky that was not for the pioneer. One page of this manuscript
might have told of a fearful winter, when the snow lay in great
drifts in the bare woods, when Tom and I fashioned canoes or
noggins out of the great roots, when a new and feminine bit of
humanity cried in the bark cradle, and Polly Ann sewed deer
leather. Another page — nay, a dozen — could be filled with Indian
horrors, ambuscades and massacres. And also I might have told how
there drifted into this land, hitherto unsoiled, the refuse cast
off by the older colonies. I must add quickly that we got more
than our share of their best stock along with this.
No sooner had the sun begun to pit the snow hillocks than wild
creatures came in from the mountains, haggard with hunger and
hardship. They had left their homes in Virginia and the Carolinas
in the autumn; an unheralded winter of Arctic fierceness had
caught them in its grip. Bitter tales they told of wives and
children buried among the rocks. Fast on the heels of these
wretched ones trooped the spring settlers in droves; and I have
seen whole churches march singing into the forts, the preacher
leading, and thanking God loudly that He had delivered them from
the wilderness and the savage. The little forts would not hold
them; and they went out to hew clearings from the forest, and to
build cabins and stockades. And our own people, starved and
snowbound, went out likewise, — Tom and Polly Ann and their little
family and myself to the farm at the river-side. And while the
water flowed between the stumps over the black land, we planted
and ploughed and prayed, always alert, watching north and south,
against the coming of the Indians.
But Tom was no husbandman. He and his kind were the scouts, the
advance guard of civilization, not tillers of the soil or lovers
of close communities. Farther and farther they went afield for
game, and always they grumbled sorely against this horde which had
driven the deer from his cover and the buffalo from his wallow.
Looking back, I can recall one evening when the long summer
twilight lingered to a close. Tom was lounging lazily against the
big persimmon tree, smoking his pipe, the two children digging at
the roots, and Polly Ann, seated on the door-log, sewing. As I
drew near, she looked up at me from her work. She was a woman upon
whose eternal freshness industry made no mar.
“Davy,” she exclaimed, “how ye’ve growed! I thought ye’d be a
wizened little body, but this year ye’ve shot up like a
cornstalk.”
“My father was six feet two inches in his moccasins,” I said.
“He’ll be wallopin’ me soon,” said Tom, with a grin. He took a
long whiff at his pipe, and added thoughtfully, “I reckon this
ain’t no place fer me now, with all the settler folks and
land-grabbers comin’ through the Gap.”
“Tom,” said I, “there’s a bit of a fall on the river here.”
“Ay,” he said, “and nary a fish left.”
“Something better,” I answered; "we’ll put a dam there and a
mill and a hominy pounder.”
“And make our fortune grinding corn for the settlers,” cried
Polly Ann, showing a line of very white teeth. "I always said ye’d
be a rich man, Davy.”
Tom was mildly interested, and went with us at daylight to
measure the fall. And he allowed that he would have the more time
to hunt if the mill were a success. For a month I had had the
scheme in my mind, where the dam was to be put, the race, and the
wondrous wheel rimmed with cow horns to dip the water. And fixed
on the wheel there was to be a crank that worked the pounder in
the mortar. So we were to grind until I could arrange with Mr.
Scarlett, the new storekeeper in Harrodstown, to have two
grinding-stones fetched across the mountains.
While the corn ripened and the melons swelled and the flax
flowered, our axes rang by the river’s side; and sometimes, as we
worked, Cowan and Terrell and McCann and other Long Hunters would
come and jeer good-naturedly because we were turning civilized.
Often they gave us a lift.
It was September when the millstones arrived, and I spent a
joyous morning of final bargaining with Mr. Myron Scarlett. This
Mr. Scarlett was from Connecticut, had been a quartermaster in the
army, and at much risk brought ploughs and hardware, and scissors
and buttons, and broadcloth and corduroy, across the Alleghanies,
and down the Ohio in flatboats. These he sold at great profit. We
had no money, not even the worthless scrip that Congress issued;
but a beaver skin was worth eighteen shillings, a bearskin ten,
and a fox or a deer or a wildcat less. Half the village watched
the barter. The rest lounged sullenly about the land court.
The land court — curse of Kentucky! It was just a windowless log
house built outside the walls, our temple of avarice. The case was
this: Henderson (for whose company Daniel Boone cut the wilderness
road) believed that he had bought the country, and issued grants
therefor. Tom held one of these grants, alas, and many others whom
I knew. Virginia repudiated Henderson. Keen-faced speculators
bought acre upon acre and tract upon tract from the State, and
crossed the mountains to extort. Claims conflicted, titles lapped.
There was the court set in the sunlight in the midst of a fair
land, held by the shameless, thronged day after day by the
homeless and the needy, jostling, quarrelling, beseeching. Even as
I looked upon this strife a man stood beside me.
“Drat ’em,” said the stranger, as he watched a hawk-eyed
extortioner in drab, for these did not condescend to hunting
shirts, “drat ’em, ef I had my way I’d wring the neck of every
mother’s son of ’em.”
I turned with a start, and there was Mr. Daniel Boone.
“Howdy, Davy,” he said; "ye’ve growed some sence ye’ve ben with
Clark.” He paused, and then continued in the same strain: "’Tis
the same at Boonesboro and up thar at the Falls settlement. The
critters is everywhar, robbin’ men of their claims. Davy,” said
Mr. Boone, earnestly, “you know that I come into Kaintuckee when
it waren’t nothin’ but wilderness, and resked my life time and
again. Them varmints is wuss’n redskins, — they’ve robbed me already
of half my claims.”
“Robbed you!” I exclaimed, indignant that he, of all men, should
suffer.
“Ay,” he said, “robbed me. They’ve took one claim after another,
tracts that I staked out long afore they heerd of Kaintuckee.” He
rubbed his rifle barrel with his buckskin sleeve. "I get a little
for my skins, and a little by surveyin’. But when the game goes I
reckon I’ll go after it.”
“Where, Mr. Boone?” I asked.
“Whar? whar the varmints cyant foller. Acrost the Mississippi
into the Spanish wilderness.”
“And leave Kentucky?” I cried.
“Davy,” he answered sadly, “you kin cope with ’em. They tell me
you’re buildin’ a mill up at McChesney’s, and I reckon you’re as
cute as any of ’em. They beat me. I’m good for nothin’ but
shootin’ and explorin’.”
We stood silent for a while, our attention caught by a quarrel
which had suddenly come out of the doorway. One of the men was Jim
Willis, — my friend of Clark’s campaign, — who had a Henderson claim
near Shawanee Springs. The other was the hawk-eyed man of whom Mr.
Boone had spoken, and fragments of their curses reached us where
we stood. The hunting shirts surged around them, alert now at the
prospect of a fight; men came running in from all directions, and
shouts of "Hang him! Tomahawk him!” were heard on every side. Mr.
Boone did not move. It was a common enough spectacle for him, and
he was not excitable. Moreover, he knew that the death of one
extortioner more or less would have no effect on the system. They
had become as the fowls of the air.
“I was acrost the mountain last month,” said Mr. Boone,
presently, “and one of them skunks had stole Campbell’s silver
spoons at Abingdon. Campbell was out arter him for a week with a
coil of rope on his saddle. But the varmint got to cover.”
Mr. Boone wished me luck in my new enterprise, bade me good-by,
and set out for Redstone, where he was to measure a tract for a
Revolutioner. The speculator having been rescued from Jim Willis’s
clutches by the sheriff, the crowd good-naturedly helped us load
our stones between pack-horses, and some of them followed us all
the way home that they might see the grinding. Half of McAfee’s
new station had heard the news, and came over likewise. And from
that day we ground as much corn as could be brought to us from
miles around.
Polly Ann and I ran the mill and kept the accounts. Often of a
crisp autumn morning we heard a gobble-gobble above the tumbling
of the water and found a wild turkey perched on top of the hopper,
eating his fill. Some of our meat we got that way. As for Tom, he
was off and on. When the roving spirit seized him he made journeys
to the westward with Cowan and Ray. Generally they returned with
packs of skins. But sometimes soberly, thanking Heaven that their
hair was left growing on their heads. This, and patrolling the
Wilderness Road and other militia duties, made up Tom’s life. No
sooner was the mill fairly started than off he went to the
Cumberland. I mention this, not alone because I remember well the
day of his return, but because of a certain happening then that
had a heavy influence on my after life.
The episode deals with an easy-mannered gentleman named Potts,
who was the agent for a certain Major Colfax of Virginia. Tom
owned under a Henderson grant; the Major had been given this and
other lands for his services in the war. Mr. Potts arrived one
rainy afternoon and found me standing alone under the little
lean-to that covered the hopper. How we served him, with the aid
of McCann and Cowan and other neighbors, and how we were near
getting into trouble because of the prank, will be seen later. The
next morning I rode into Harrodstown not wholly easy in my mind
concerning the wisdom of the thing I had done. There was no one to
advise me, for Colonel Clark was far away, building a fort on the
banks of the Mississippi. Tom had laughed at the consequences; he
cared little about his land, and was for moving into the
Wilderness again. But for Polly Ann’s sake I wished that we had
treated the land agent less cavalierly. I was soon distracted from
these thoughts by the sight of Harrodstown itself.
I had no sooner ridden out of the forest shade when I saw that
the place was in an uproar, men and women gathering in groups and
running here and there between the cabins. Urging on the mare, I
cantered across the fields, and the first person I met was James
Ray.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.
“Matter enough! An army of redskins has crossed the Ohio, and
not a man to take command. My God,” cried Ray, pointing angrily at
the swarms about the land office, “what trash we have got this
last year! Kentucky can go to the devil, half the stations be
wiped out, and not a thrip do they care.”
“Have you sent word to the Colonel?” I asked.
“If he was here,” said Ray, bitterly, “he’d have half of ’em
swinging inside of an hour. I’ll warrant he’d send ’em to the
right-about.”
I rode on into the town, Potts gone out of my mind. Apart from
the land-office crowds, and looking on in silent rage, stood a
group of the old settlers, — tall, lean, powerful, yet impotent for
lack of a leader. A contrast they were, these buckskin-clad
pioneers, to the ill-assorted humanity they watched, absorbed in
struggles for the very lands they had won.
“By the eternal!” said Jack Terrell, “if the yea’th was ter
swaller ’em up, they’d keep on a-dickerin in hell.”
“Something’s got to be done,” Captain Harrod put in gloomily;
"the red varmints’ll be on us in another day. In God’s name, whar
is Clark?”
“Hold!” cried Fletcher Blount, “what’s that?”
The broiling about the land court, too, was suddenly hushed. Men
stopped in their tracks, staring fixedly at three forms which had
come out of the woods into the clearing.
“Redskins, or there’s no devil!” said Terrell.
Redskins they were, but not the blanketed kind that drifted
every day through the station. Their war-paint gleamed in the
light, and the white edges of the feathered head-dresses caught
the sun. One held up in his right hand a white belt, — token of
peace on the frontier.
“Lord A’mighty!” said Fletcher Blount, “be they Cricks?”
“Chickasaws, by the headgear,” said Terrell. "Davy, you’ve got a
hoss. Ride out and look em over.”
Nothing loath, I put the mare into a gallop, and I passed over
the very place where Polly Ann had picked me up and saved my life
long since. The Indians came on at a dog trot, but when they were
within fifty paces of me they halted abruptly. The chief waved the
white belt around his head.
“Davy!” says he, and I trembled from head to foot. How well I
knew that voice!
“Colonel Clark!” I cried, and rode up to him. "Thank God you are
come, sir,” said I, “for the people here are land-mad, and the
Northern Indians are crossing the Ohio.”
He took my bridle, and, leading the horse, began to walk rapidly
towards the station.
“Ay,” he answered, “I know it. A runner came to me with the
tidings, where I was building a fort on the Mississippi, and I
took Willis here and Saunders, and came.”
I glanced at my old friends, who grinned at me through the
berry-stain on their faces. We reached a ditch through which the
rain of the night before was draining from the fields Clark
dropped the bridle, stooped down, and rubbed his face clean. Up he
got again and flung the feathers from his head, and I thought that
his eyes twinkled despite the sternness of his look.
“Davy, my lad,” said he, “you and I have seen some strange
things together. Perchance we shall see stranger to-day.”
A shout went up, for he had been recognized. And Captain Harrod
and Ray and Terrell and Cowan (who had just ridden in) ran up to
greet him and press his hand. He called them each by name, these
men whose loyalty had been proved, but said no word more nor
paused in his stride until he had reached the edge of the mob
about the land court. There he stood for a full minute, and we who
knew him looked on silently and waited.
The turmoil had begun again, the speculators calling out in
strident tones, the settlers bargaining and pushing, and all
clamoring to be heard. While there was money to be made or land to
be got they had no ear for the public weal. A man shouldered his
way through, roughly, and they gave back, cursing, surprised. He
reached the door, and, flinging those who blocked it right and
left, entered. There he was recognized, and his name flew from
mouth to mouth.
“Clark!”
He walked up to the table, strewn with books and deeds.
“Silence!” he thundered. But there was no need, — they were still
for once. "This court is closed,” he cried "while Kentucky is in
danger. Not a deed shall be signed nor an acre granted until I
come back from the Ohio. Out you go!”
Out they went indeed, judge, brokers, speculators — the evicted
and the triumphant together. And when the place was empty Clark
turned the key and thrust it into his hunting shirt. He stood for
a moment on the step, and his eyes swept the crowd.
“Now,” he said, “there have been many to claim this land — who
will follow me to defend it?”
As I live, they cheered him. Hands were flung up that were past
counting, and men who were barely rested from the hardships of the
Wilderness Trail shouted their readiness to go. But others slunk
away, and were found that morning grumbling and cursing the chance
that had brought them to Kentucky. Within the hour the news had
spread to the farms, and men rode in to Harrodstown to tell the
Colonel of many who were leaving the plough in the furrow and the
axe in the wood, and starting off across the mountains in anger
and fear. The Colonel turned to me as he sat writing down the
names of the volunteers.
“Davy,” said he, “when you are grown you shall not stay at home,
I promise you. Take your mare and ride as for your life to
McChesney, and tell him to choose ten men and go to the Crab
Orchard on the Wilderness Road. Tell him for me to turn back every
man, woman, and child who tries to leave Kentucky.”
I met Tom coming in from the field with his rawhide harness over
his shoulders. Polly Ann stood calling him in the door, and the
squirrel broth was steaming on the table. He did not wait for it.
Kissing her, he flung himself into the saddle I had left, and we
watched him mutely as he waved back to us from the edge of the
woods.
In the night I found myself sitting up in bed, listening to a
running and stamping near the cabin.
Polly Ann was stirring. "Davy,” she whispered, “the stock is
oneasy.”
We peered out of the loophole together and through the little
orchard we had planted. The moon flooded the fields, and beyond it
the forest was a dark blur. I can recall the scene now, the rude
mill standing by the water-side, the twisted rail fences, and the
black silhouettes of the horses and cattle as they stood bunched
together. Behind us little Tom stirred in his sleep and startled
us. That very evening Polly Ann had frightened him into obedience
by telling him that the Shawanees would get him.
What was there to do? McAfee’s Station was four miles away, and
Ray’s clearing two. Ray was gone with Tom. I could not leave Polly
Ann alone. There was nothing for it but to wait.
Silently, that the children might not be waked and lurking
savage might not hear, we put the powder and bullets in the middle
of the room and loaded the guns and pistols. For Polly Ann had
learned to shoot. She took the loopholes of two sides of the
cabin, I of the other two, and then began the fearful watching and
waiting which the frontier knows so well. Suddenly the cattle
stirred again, and stampeded to the other corner of the field.
There came a whisper from Polly Ann.
“What is it?” I answered, running over to her.
“Look out,” she said; "what d’ye see near the mill?”
Her sharp eyes had not deceived her, for mine perceived plainly
a dark form skulking in the hickory grove. Next, a movement behind
the rail fence, and darting back to my side of the house I made
out a long black body wriggling at the edge of the withered
corn-patch. They were surrounding us. How I wished that Tom were
home!
A stealthy sound began to intrude itself upon our ears.
Listening intently, I thought it came from the side of the cabin
where the lean-to was, where we stored our wood in winter. The
black shadow fell on that side, and into a patch of bushes;
peering out of the loophole, I could perceive nothing there. The
noise went on at intervals. All at once there grew on me, with
horror, the discovery that there was digging under the cabin.
How long the sound continued I know not, — it might have been an
hour, it might have been less. Now I thought I heard it under the
wall, now beneath the puncheons of the floor. The pitchy blackness
within was such that we could not see the boards moving, and
therefore we must needs kneel down and feel them from time to
time. Yes, this one was lifting from its bed on the hard earth
beneath. I was sure of it. It rose an inch — then an inch more.
Gripping the handle of my tomahawk, I prayed for guidance in my
stroke, for the blade might go wild in the darkness. Upward crept
the board, and suddenly it was gone from the floor. I swung a full
circle — and to my horror I felt the axe plunging into soft flesh
and crunching on a bone. I had missed the head! A yell shattered
the night as the puncheon fell with a rattle on the boards, and my
tomahawk was gone from my hand. Without, the fierce war-cry of the
Shawanees that I knew so well echoed around the log walls, and the
door trembled with a blow. The children awoke, crying.
There was no time to think; my great fear was that the devil in
the cabin would kill Polly Ann. Just then I heard her calling out
to me.
“Hide!” I cried, “hide under the shake-down! Has he got you?”
I heard her answer, and then the sound of a scuffle that
maddened me. Knife in hand, I crept slowly about, and put my
fingers on a man’s neck and side. Next Polly Ann careened against
me, and I lost him again. "Davy, Davy,” I heard her gasp, “look
out fer the floor!”
It was too late. The puncheon rose under me, I stumbled, and it
fell again. Once more the awful changing notes of the war-whoop
sounded without. A body bumped on the boards, a white light rose
before my eyes, and a sharp pain leaped in my side. Then all was
black again, but I had my senses still, and my fingers closed
around the knotted muscles of an arm. I thrust the pistol in my
hand against flesh, and fired. Two of us fell together, but the
thought of Polly Ann got me staggering to my feet again, calling
her name. By the grace of God I heard her answer.
“Are ye hurt, Davy?”
“No,” said I, “no. And you?”
We drifted together. ’Twas she who had the presence of mind.
“The chest — quick, the chest!”
We stumbled over a body in reaching it. We seized the handles,
and with all our strength hauled it athwart the loose puncheon
that seemed to be lifting even then. A mighty splintering shook
the door.
“To the ports!” cried Polly Ann, as our heads knocked together.
To find the rifles and prime them seemed to take an age. Next I
was staring through the loophole along a barrel, and beyond it
were three black forms in line on a long beam. I think we
fired — Polly Ann and I — at the same time. One fell. We saw a comedy
of the beam dropping heavily on the foot of another, and he
limping off with a guttural howl of rage and pain. I fired a
pistol at him, but missed him, and then I was ramming a powder
charge down the long barrel of the rifle. Suddenly there was
silence, — even the children had ceased crying. Outside, in the
dooryard, a feathered figure writhed like a snake towards the
fence. The moon still etched the picture in black and white.
Shots awoke me, I think, distant shots. And they sounded like
the ripping and tearing of cloth for a wound. ’Twas no new sound
to me.
“Davy, dear,” said a voice, tenderly.
Out of the mist the tear-stained face of Polly Ann bent over me.
I put up my hand, and dropped it again with a cry. Then, my senses
coming with a rush, the familiar objects of the cabin outlined
themselves: Tom’s winter hunting shirt, Polly Ann’s woollen shift
and sunbonnet on their pegs; the big stone chimney, the ladder to
the loft, the closed door, with a long, jagged line across it
where the wood was splintered; and, dearest of all, the chubby
forms of Peggy and little Tom playing on the trundle-bed. Then my
glance wandered to the floor, and on the puncheons were three
stains. I closed my eyes.
Again came a far-off rattle, like stones falling from a great
height down a rocky bluff.
“What’s that?” I whispered.
“They’re fighting at McAfee’s Station,” said Polly Ann. She put
her cool hand on my head, and little Tom climbed up on the bed and
looked up into my face, wistfully calling my name.
“Oh, Davy,” said his mother, “I thought ye were never coming
back.”
“And the redskins?” I asked.
She drew the child away, lest he hurt me, and shuddered.
“I reckon ’twas only a war-party,” she answered. "The rest is at
McAfee’s. And if they beat ’em off — " she stopped abruptly.
“We shall be saved,” I said.
I shall never forget that day. Polly Ann left my side only to
feed the children and to keep watch out of the loopholes, and I
lay on my back, listening and listening to the shots. At last
these became scattered. Then, though we strained our ears, we
heard them no more. Was the fort taken? The sun slid across the
heavens and shot narrow blades of light, now through one loophole
and now through another, until a ray slanted from the western wall
and rested upon the red-and-black paint of two dead bodies in the
corner. I stared with horror.
“I was afeard to open the door and throw ’em out,” said Polly
Ann, apologetically.
Still I stared. One of them had a great cleft across his face.
“But I thought I hit him in the shoulder,” I exclaimed.
Polly Ann thrust her hand, gently, across my eyes. "Davy, ye
mustn’t talk,” she said; "that’s a dear.”
Drowsiness seized me. But I resisted.
“You killed him, Polly Ann,” I murmured, “you?”
“Hush,” said Polly Ann.
And I slept again.
CHAPTER II.
“the beggars are come to town”
“THEY WAS that destitute,” said Tom, “’twas a pity to see ’em.”
“And they be grand folks, ye say?” said Polly Ann.
“Grand folks, I reckon. And helpless as babes on the Wilderness
Trail. They had two niggers — his nigger an’ hers — and they was
tuckered, too, fer a fact.
“Lawsy!” exclaimed Polly Ann. "Be still, honey!” Taking a piece
of corn-pone from the cupboard, she bent over and thrust it
between little Peggy’s chubby fingers "Be still, honey, and listen
to what your Pa says. Whar did ye find ’em, Tom?”
“’Twas Jim Ray found ’em,” said Tom. "We went up to Crab
Orchard, accordin’ to the Colonel’s orders and we was thar three
days. Ye ought to hev seen the trash we turned back, Polly Ann!
Most of ’em was scared plum’ crazy, and they was fer gittin ’out
’n Kaintuckee at any cost. Some was fer fightin’ their way through
us.”
“The skulks!” exclaimed Polly Ann. "They tried to kill ye? What
did ye do?”
Tom grinned, his mouth full of bacon.
“Do?” says he; "we shot a couple of ’em in the legs and arms,
and bound ’em up again. They was in a t’arin’ rage. I’m more
afeard of a scar’t man, — a real scar’t man — nor a rattler. They
cussed us till they was hoarse. Said they’d hev us hung, an’
Clark, too. Said they hed a right to go back to Virginny if they
hed a mind.”
“An’ what did ye say?” demanded Polly Ann, pausing in her work,
her eyes flashing with resentment. "Did ye tell ’em they was
cowards to want to settle lands, and not fight for ’em? Other
folks’ lands, too.”
“We didn’t tell ’em nothin’,” said Tom; "jest sent ’em kitin’
back to the stations whar they come from.”
“I reckon they won’t go foolin’ with Clark’s boys again,” said
Polly Ann, resuming a vigorous rubbing of the skillet. "Ye was
tellin’ me about these fine folks ye fetched home.” She tossed her
head in the direction of the open door, and I wondered if the fine
folks were outside.
“Oh, ay,” said Tom, “they was comin’ this way, from the
Carolinys. Jim Ray went out to look for a deer, and found ’em off
’n the trail. By the etarnal, they was tuckered. He was the wust,
Jim said, lyin’ down on a bed of laurels she and the niggers made.
She has sperrit, that woman. Jim fed him, and he got up. She
wouldn’t eat nothin’, and made Jim put him on his hoss. She
walked. I can’t mek out why them aristocrats wants to come to
Kaintuckee. They’re a sight too tender.”
“Pore things!” said Polly Ann, compassionately. "So ye fetched
’em home.”
“They hadn’t a place ter go,” said he, “and I reckoned ’twould
give ’em time ter ketch breath, an’ turn around. I told ’em livin’
in Kaintuck was kinder rough.”
“Mercy!” said Polly Ann, “ter think that they was use’ ter
silver spoons, and linen, and niggers ter wait on ’em. Tom, ye
must shoot a turkey, and I’ll do my best to give ’em a good
supper.” Tom rose obediently, and seized his coonskin hat. She
stopped him with a word.
“Tom.”
“Ay?”
“Mayhap — mayhap Davy would know ’em. He’s been to Charlestown
with the gentry there.”
“Mayhap,” agreed Tom. "Pore little deevil,” said he, “he’s hed a
hard time.”
“He’ll be right again soon,” said Polly Ann. "He’s been sleepin’
that way, off and on, fer a week.” Her voice faltered into a note
of tenderness as her eyes rested on me.
“I reckon we owe Davy a heap, Polly Ann,” said he.
I was about to interrupt, but Polly Ann’s next remark arrested
me.
“Tom,” said she, “he oughter be eddicated.”
“Eddicated!” exclaimed Tom, with a kind of dismay.
“Yes, eddicated,” she repeated. "He ain’t like you and me. He’s
different. He oughter be a lawyer, or somethin’.”
Tom reflected.
“Ay,” he answered, “the Colonel says that same thing. He oughter
be sent over the mountain to git l’arnin’.”
“And we’ll be missing him sore,” said Polly Ann, with a sigh.
I wanted to speak then, but the words would not come.
“Whar hev they gone?” said Tom.
“To take a walk,” said Polly Ann, and laughed. "The gentry has
sech fancies as that. Tom, I reckon I’ll fly over to Mrs. McCann’s
an’ beg some of that prime bacon she has.”
Tom picked up his ride, and they went out together. I lay for a
long time reflecting. To the strange guests whom Tom in the
kindness of his heart had brought back and befriended I gave
little attention. I was overwhelmed by the love which had just
been revealed to me. And so I was to be educated. It had been in
my mind these many years, but I had never spoken of it to Polly
Ann. Dear Polly Ann! My eyes filled at the thought that she
herself had determined upon this sacrifice.
There were footsteps at the door, and these I heard, and heeded
not. Then there came a voice, — a woman’s voice, modulated and
trained in the perfections of speech and in the art of treating
things lightly. At the sound of that voice I caught my breath.
“What a pastoral! Harry, if we have sought for virtue in the
wilderness, we have found it.”
“When have we ever sought for virtue, Sarah?”
It was the man who answered and stirred another chord of my
memory.
“When, indeed!” said the woman; "’tis a luxury that is denied
us, I fear me.”
“Egad, we have run the gamut, all but that.”
I thought the woman sighed.
“Our hosts are gone out,” she said, “bless their simple souls!
’Tis Arcady, Harry, ’where thieves do not break in and steal.’
That’s Biblical, isn’t it?” She paused, and joined in the man’s
laugh. "I remember — " She stopped abruptly.
“Thieves!” said he, “not in our sense. And yet a fortnight ago
this sylvan retreat was the scene of murder and sudden death.”
“Yes, Indians,” said the woman; "but they are beaten off and
forgotten. Troubles do not last here. Did you see the boy? He’s in
there, in the corner, getting well of a fearful hacking. Mrs.
McChesney says he saved her and her brats.”
“Ay, McChesney told me,” said the man. "Let’s have a peep at
him.”
In they came, and I looked on the woman, and would have leaped
from my bed had the strength been in me. Superb she was, though
her close-fitting travelling gown of green cloth was frayed and
torn by the briers, and the beauty of her face enhanced by the
marks of I know not what trials and emotions. Little,
dark-pencilled lines under the eyes were nigh robbing these of the
haughtiness I had once seen and hated. Set high on her hair was a
curving, green hat with a feather, ill-suited to the wilderness.
I looked on the man. He was as ill-equipped as she. A London
tailor must have cut his suit of gray. A single band of linen,
soiled by the journey, was wound about his throat, and I remember
oddly the buttons stuck on his knees and cuffs, and these
silk-embroidered in a criss-cross pattern of lighter gray. Some
had been torn off. As for his face, ’twas as handsome as ever, for
dissipation sat well upon it.
My thoughts flew back to that day long gone when a friendless
boy rode up a long drive to a pillared mansion. I saw again the
picture. The horse with the craning neck, the liveried servant at
the bridle, the listless young gentleman with the shiny boots
reclining on the horse-block, and above him, under the portico,
the grand lady whose laugh had made me sad. And I remembered, too,
the wild, neglected lad who had been to me as a brother,
warm-hearted and generous, who had shared what he had with a
foundling, who had wept with me in my first great sorrow. Where
was he?
For I was face to face once more with Mrs. Temple and Mr. Harry
Riddle!
The lady started as she gazed at me, and her tired eyes widened.
She clutched Mr. Riddle’s arm.
“Harry!” she cried, “Harry, he puts me in mind of — of some one — I
cannot think.”
Mr. Riddle laughed nervously.
“There, there, Sally,” says he, “all brats resemble somebody. I
have heard you say so a dozen times.”
She turned upon him an appealing glance.
“Oh!” she said, with a little catch of her breath, “is there no
such thing as oblivion? Is there a place in the world that is not
haunted? I am cursed with memory.”
“Or the lack of it,” answered Mr. Riddle, pulling out a silver
snuff-box from his pocket and staring at it ruefully. "Damme, the
snuff I fetched from Paris is gone, all but a pinch. Here is a
real tragedy.”
“It was the same in Rome,” the lady continued, unheeding, “when
we met the Izards, and at Venice that nasty Colonel Tarleton saw
us at the opera. In London we must needs run into the Manners from
Maryland. In Paris — "
“In Paris we were safe enough,” Mr. Riddle threw in hastily.
“And why?” she flashed back at him.
He did not answer that.
“A truce with your fancies, madam,” said he. "Behold a soul of
good nature! I have followed you through half the civilized
countries of the globe — none of them are good enough. You must
needs cross the ocean again, and come to the wilds. We nearly die
on the trail, are picked up by a Samaritan in buckskin and taken
into the bosom of his worthy family. And forsooth, you look at a
backwoods urchin, and are nigh to swooning.”
“Hush, Harry,” she cried, starting forward and peering into my
face; "he will hear you.”
“Tut!” said Harry, “what if he does? London and Paris are words
to him. We might as well be speaking French. And I’ll take my oath
he’s sleeping.”
The corner where I lay was dark, for the cabin had no windows.
And if my life had depended upon speaking, I could have found no
fit words then.
She turned from me, and her mood changed swiftly. For she
laughed lightly, musically, and put a hand on his shoulder.
“Perchance I am ghost-ridden,” she said.
“They are not ghosts of a past happiness, at all events,” he
answered.
She sat down on a stool before the hearth, and clasping her
fingers upon her knee looked thoughtfully into the embers of the
fire. Presently she began to speak in a low, even voice, he
looking down at her, his feet apart, his hand thrust backward
towards the heat.
“Harry,” she said, “do you remember all our contrivances? How
you used to hold my hand in the garden under the table, while I
talked brazenly to Mr. Mason? And how jealous Jack Temple used to
get?” She laughed again, softly, always looking at the fire.
“Damnably jealous!” agreed Mr. Riddle, and yawned. "Served him
devilish right for marrying you. And he was a blind fool for five
long years.”
“Yes, blind,” the lady agreed. "How could he have been so blind?
How well I recall the day he rode after us in the woods.”
“’Twas the parson told, curse him!” said Mr. Riddle. "We should
have gone that night, if your courage had held.”
“My courage!” she cried, flashing a look upwards, “my foresight.
A pretty mess we had made of it without my inheritance. ’Tis small
enough, the Lord knows. In Europe we should have been dregs. We
should have starved in the wilderness with you a-farming.”
He looked down at her curiously.
“Devilish queer talk,” said he, “but while we are in it, I
wonder where Temple is now. He got aboard the King’s frigate with
a price on his head. Williams told me he saw him in London, at
White’s. Have — have you ever heard, Sarah?”
She shook her head, her glance returning to the ashes.
“No,” she answered.
“Faith,” says Mr. Riddle, “he’ll scarce turn up here.”
She did not answer that, but sat motionless.
“He’ll scarce turn up here, in these wilds,” Mr. Riddle
repeated, “and what I am wondering, Sarah, is how the devil we are
to live here.”
“How do these good people live, who helped us when we were
starving?”
Mr. Riddle flung his hand eloquently around the cabin. There was
something of disgust in the gesture.
“You see!” he said, “love in a cottage.”
“But it is love,” said the lady, in a low tone.
He broke into laughter.
“Sally,” he cried, “I have visions of you gracing the board at
which we sat to-day, patting journey-cakes on the hearth, stewing
squirrel broth with the same pride that you once planned a rout.
Cleaning the pots and pans, and standing anxious at the doorway
staring through a sunbonnet for your lord and master.”
“My lord and master!” said the lady, and there was so much of
scorn in the words that Mr. Riddle winced.
“Come,” he said, “I grant now that you could make pans shine
like pier-glasses, that you could cook bacon to a turn — although I
would have laid an hundred guineas against it some years ago. What
then? Are you to be contented with four log walls? With the
intellectual companionship of the McChesneys and their friends?
Are you to depend for excitement upon the chances of having the
hair neatly cut from your head by red fiends? Come, we’ll go back
to the Rue St. Dominique, to the suppers and the card parties of
the countess. We’ll be rid of regrets for a life upon which we
have turned our backs forever.”
She shook her head, sadly.
“It’s no use, Harry,” said she, “we’ll never be rid of regrets.”
“We’ll never have a barony like Temple Bow, and races every
week, and gentry round about. But, damn it, the Rebels have
spoiled all that since the war.”
“Those are not the regrets I mean,” answered Mrs. Temple.
“What then, in Heaven’s name?” he cried. "You were not wont to
be thus. But now I vow you go beyond me. What then?”
She did not answer, but sat leaning forward over the hearth, he
staring at her in angry perplexity. A sound broke the afternoon
stillness, — the pattering of small, bare feet on the puncheons. A
tremor shook the woman’s shoulders, and little Tom stood before
her, a quaint figure in a butternut smock, his blue eyes
questioning. He laid a hand on her arm.
Then a strange thing happened. With a sudden impulse she turned
and flung her arms about the boy and strained him to her, and
kissed his brown hair. He struggled, but when she released him he
sat very still on her knee, looking into her face. For he was a
solemn child. The lady smiled at him, and there were two splashes
like raindrops on her fair cheeks.
As for Mr. Riddle, he went to the door, looked out, and took a
last pinch of snuff.
“Here is the mistress of the house coming back,” he cried, “and
singing like the shepherdess in the opera.”
It was Polly Ann indeed. At the sound of his mother’s voice,
little Tom jumped down from the lady’s lap and ran past Mr. Riddle
at the door. Mrs. Temple’s thoughts were gone across the
mountains.
“And what is that you have under your arm?” said Mr. Riddle, as
he gave back.
“I’ve fetched some prime bacon fer your supper, sir,” said Polly
Ann, all rosy from her walk; "what I have ain’t fit to give ye.”
Mrs. Temple rose.
“My dear,” she said, “what you have is too good for us. And if
you do such a thing again, I shall be very angry.
“Lord, ma’am,” exclaimed Polly Ann, “and you use’ ter dainties
an’ silver an’ linen! Tom is gone to try to git a turkey for ye.”
She paused, and looked compassionately at the lady. "Bless ye,
ma’am, ye’re that tuckered from the mountains! ’Tis a fearsome
journey.”
“Yes,” said the lady, simply, “I am tired.”
“Small wonder!” exclaimed Polly Ann. "To think what ye’ve been
through — yere husband near to dyin’ afore yere eyes, and ye
a-reskin’ yere own life to save him — so Tom tells me. When Tom goes
out a-fightin’ red-skins I’m that fidgety I can’t set still. I
wouldn’t let him know what I feel fer the world. But well ye know
the pain of it, who love yere husband like that.”
The lady would have smiled bravely, had the strength been given
her. She tried. And then, with a shudder, she hid her face in her
hands.
“Oh, don’t!” she exclaimed, “don’t!”
Mr. Riddle went out.
“There, there, ma’am,” she said, “I hedn’t no right ter speak,
and ye fair worn out.” She drew her gently into a chair. "Set
down, ma’am, and don’t ye stir tell supper’s ready.” She brushed
her eyes with her sleeve, and, stepping briskly to my bed, bent
over me. "Davy,” she said, “Davy, how be ye?”
“Davy!”
It was the lady’s voice. She stood facing us, and never while I
live shall I forget that which I saw in her eyes. Some resemblance
it bore to the look of the hunted deer, but in the animal it is
dumb, appealing. Understanding made the look of the woman terrible
to behold, — understanding, ay, and courage. For she did not lack
this last quality. Polly Ann gave back in a kind of dismay, and I
shivered.
“Yes,” I answered, “I am David Ritchie.”
“You — you dare to judge me!” she cried.
I knew not why she said this.
“To judge you?” I repeated.
“Yes, to judge me,” she answered. "I know you, David Ritchie,
and the blood that runs in you. Your mother was a foolish — saint"
(she laughed), “who lifted her eyebrows when I married her
brother, John Temple. That was her condemnation of me, and it
stung me more than had a thousand sermons. A doting saint, because
she followed your father into the mountain wilds to her death for
a whim of his. And your father. A Calvinist fanatic who had no
mercy on sin, save for that particular weakness of his own — "
“Stop, Mrs. Temple!” I cried, lifting up in bed. And to my
astonishment she was silenced, looking at me in amazement. "You
had your vengeance when I came to you, when you turned from me
with a lift of your shoulders at the news of my father’s death.
And now — "
“And now?” she repeated questioningly.
“Now I thought you were changed,” I said slowly, for the
excitement was telling on me.
“You listened!” she said.
“I pitied you.”
“Oh, pity!” she cried. "My God, that you should pity me!” She
straightened, and summoned all the spirit that was in her. "I
would rather be called a name than have the pity of you and
yours.”
“You cannot change it, Mrs. Temple,” I answered, and fell back
on the nettle-bark sheets. "You cannot change it,” I heard myself
repeating, as though it were another’s voice. And I knew that
Polly Ann was bending over me and calling me.
“Where did they go, Polly Ann?” I asked.
“Acrost the Mississippi, to the lands of the Spanish King,” said
Polly Ann.
“And where in those dominions?” I demanded.
“John Saunders took ’em as far as the Falls,” Polly Ann
answered. "He ’lowed they was goin’ to St. Louis. But they never
said a word. I reckon they’ll be hunted as long as they live.”
I had thought of them much as I lay on my back recovering from
the fever, — the fever for which Mrs. Temple was to blame. Yet I
bore her no malice. And many other thoughts I had, probing back
into childhood memories for the solving of problems there.
“I knowed ye come of gentlefolks, Davy,” Polly Ann had said when
we talked together.
So I was first cousin to Nick, and nephew to that selfish
gentleman, Mr. Temple, in whose affectionate care I had been left
in Charlestown by my father. And my father? Who had he been? I
remembered the speech that he had used and taught me, and how his
neighbors had dubbed him "aristocrat.” But Mrs. Temple was gone,
and it was not in likelihood that I should ever see her more.
TWO YEARS went by, two uneventful years for me, two mighty years
for Kentucky. Westward rolled the tide of emigrants to change her
character, but to swell her power. Towns and settlements sprang up
in a season and flourished, and a man could scarce keep pace with
the growth of them. Doctors came, and ministers, and lawyers;
generals and majors, and captains and subalterns of the
Revolution, to till their grants and to found families. There were
gentry, too, from the tide-waters, come to retrieve the fortunes
which they had lost by their patriotism. There were storekeepers
like Mr. Scarlett, adventurers and ne’er-do-weels who hoped to
start with a clean slate, and a host of lazy vagrants who thought
to scratch the soil and find abundance.
I must not forget how, at the age of seventeen, I became a
landowner, thanks to my name being on the roll of Colonel Clark’s
regiment. For, in a spirit of munificence, the Assembly of the
Commonwealth of Virginia had awarded to every private in that
regiment one hundred and eight acres of land on the Ohio River,
north of the Falls. Sergeant Thomas McChesney, as a reward for his
services in one of the severest campaigns in history, received a
grant of two hundred and sixteen acres! You who will may look at
the plat made by William Clark, Surveyor for the Board of
Commissioners, and find sixteen acres marked for Thomas McChesney
in Section 169, and two hundred more in Section 3. Section 3
fronted the Ohio some distance above Bear Grass Creek, and was, of
course, on the Illinois shore. As for my own plots, some miles in
the interior, I never saw them. But I own them to this day.
I mention these things as bearing on the story of my life, with
which I must get on. And, therefore, I may not dwell upon this
injustice to the men who won an empire and were flung a bone long
afterwards.
It was early autumn once more, and such a busy week we had had
at the mill, that Tom was perforce obliged to remain at home and
help, though he longed to be gone with Cowan and Ray a-hunting to
the southwest. Up rides a man named Jarrott, flings himself from
his horse, passes the time of day as he watches the grinding,
helps Tom to tie up a sack or two, and hands him a paper.
“What’s this?” says Tom, staring at it blankly.
“Ye won’t blame me, Mac,” answers Mr. Jarrott, somewhat ashamed
of his role of process-server. "’Tain’t none of my doin’s.”
“Read it, Davy,” said Tom, giving it to me.
I stopped the mill, and, unfolding the paper, read. I remember
not the quaint wording of it, save that it was ill-spelled and
ill-writ generally. In short, it was a summons for Tom to appear
before the court at Danville on a certain day in the following
week, and I made out that a Mr. Neville Colfax was the plaintiff
in the matter, and that the suit had to do with land.
“Neville Colfax!” I exclaimed, “that’s the man for whom Mr.
Potts was agent.”
“Ay, ay,” said Tom, and sat him down on the meal-bags. "Drat the
varmint, he kin hev the land.”
“Hev the land?” cried Polly Ann, who had come in upon us. "Hev
ye no sperrit, Tom McChesney?”
“There’s no chance ag’in the law,” said Tom, hopelessly. "Thar’s
Perkins had his land tuck away last year, and Terrell’s moved out,
and twenty more I could name. And thar’s Dan’l Boone, himself.
Most the rich bottom he tuck up the critters hev got away from
him.”
“Ye’ll go to Danville and take Davy with ye and fight it,”
answered Polly Ann, decidedly. "Davy has a word to say, I reckon.
’Twas he made the mill and scar’t that Mr. Potts away. I reckon
he’ll git us out of this fix.”
Mr. Jarrott applauded her courage.
“Ye have the grit, ma’am,” he said, as he mounted his horse
again. "Here’s luck to ye!”
The remembrance of Mr. Potts weighed heavily upon my mind during
the next week. Perchance Tom would have to pay for this prank
likewise. ’Twas indeed a foolish, childish thing to have done, and
I might have known that it would only have put off the evil day of
reckoning. Since then, by reason of the mill site and the business
we got by it, the land had become the most valuable in that part
of the country. Had I known Colonel Clark’s whereabouts, I should
have gone to him for advice and comfort. As it was, we were forced
to await the issue without counsel. Polly Ann and I talked it over
many times while Tom sat, morose and silent, in a corner. He was
the pioneer pure and simple, afraid of no man, red or white, in
open combat, but defenceless in such matters as this.
“’Tis Davy will save us, Tom,” said Polly Ann, “with the
l’arnin’ he’s got while the corn was grindin’.”
I had, indeed, been reading at the mill while the hopper emptied
itself, such odd books as drifted into Harrodstown. One of these
was called "Bacon’s Abridgment"; it dealt with law and it puzzled
me sorely.
“And the children,” Polly Ann continued, — "ye’ll not make me pick
up the four of ’em, and pack it to Louisiana, because Mr. Colfax
wants the land we’ve made for ourselves.”
There were four of them now, indeed, — the youngest still in the
bark cradle in the corner. He bore a no less illustrious name than
that of the writer of these chronicles.
It would be hard to say which was the more troubled, Tom or I,
that windy morning we set out on the Danville trace. Polly Ann
alone had been serene, — ay, and smiling and hopeful. She had kissed
us each good-by impartially. And we left her, with a future
governor of Kentucky on her shoulder, tripping lightly down to the
mill to grind the McGarrys’ corn.
When the forest was cleared at Danville, Justice was housed
first. She was not the serene, inexorable dame whom we have seen
in pictures holding her scales above the jars of earth. Justice at
Danville was a somewhat high-spirited, quarrelsome lady who
decided matters oftenest with the stroke of a sword. There was a
certain dignity about her temple withal, — for instance, if a judge
wore linen, that linen must not be soiled. Nor was it etiquette
for a judge to lay his own hands in chastisement on contemptuous
persons, though Justice at Danville had more compassion than her
sisters in older communities upon human failings.
There was a temple built to her "of hewed or sawed logs nine
inches thick" — so said the specifications. Within the temple was a
rude platform which served as a bar, and since Justice is supposed
to carry a torch in her hand, there were no windows, — nor any
windows in the jail next door, where some dozen offenders
languished on the afternoon that Tom and I rode into town.
There was nothing auspicious in the appearance of Danville, and
no man might have said then that the place was to be the scene of
portentous conventions which were to decide the destiny of a
State. Here was a sprinkling of log cabins, some in the building,
and an inn, by courtesy so called. Tom and I would have preferred
to sleep in the woods near by, with our feet to the blaze; this
was partly from motives of economy, and partly because Tom, in
common with other pioneers, held an inn in contempt. But to come
back to our arrival.
It was a sunny and windy afternoon, and the leaves were flying
in the air. Around the court-house was a familiar, buzzing
scene, — the backwoodsmen, lounging against the wall or brawling
over their claims, the sleek agents and attorneys, and half a
dozen of a newer type. These were adventurous young gentlemen of
family, some of them lawyers and some of them late officers in the
Continental army who had been rewarded with grants of land. These
were the patrons of the log tavern which stood near by with the
blackened stumps around it, where there was much card-playing and
roistering, ay, and even duelling, of nights.
“Thar’s Mac,” cried a backwoodsman who was sitting on the
court-house steps as we rode up. "Howdy, Mac; be they tryin’ to
git your land, too?”
“Howdy, Mac,” said a dozen more, paying a tribute to Tom’s
popularity. And some of them greeted me.
“Is this whar they take a man’s land away?” says Tom, jerking
his thumb at the open door.
Tom had no intention of uttering a witticism, but his words were
followed by loud guffaws from all sides, even the lawyers joining
in.
“I reckon this is the place, Tom,” came the answer.
“I reckon I’ll take a peep in thar,” said Tom, leaping off his
horse and shouldering his way to the door. I followed him,
curious. The building was half full. Two elderly gentlemen of
grave demeanor sat on stools behind a puncheon table, and near
them a young man was writing. Behind the young man was a young
gentleman who was closing a speech as we entered, and he had
spoken with such vehemence that the perspiration stood out on his
brow. There was a murmur from those listening, and I saw Tom
pressing his way to the front.
“Hev any of ye seen a feller named Colfax?” cries Tom, in a loud
voice. "He says he owns the land I settled, and he ain’t ever seed
it.”
There was a roar of laughter, and even the judges smiled.
“Whar is he?” cries Tom; "said he’d be here to-day.”
Another gust of laughter drowned his words, and then one of the
judges got up and rapped on the table. The gentleman who had just
made the speech glared mightily, and I supposed he had lost the
effect of it.
“What do you mean by interrupting the court?” cried the judge.
"Get out, sir, or I’ll have you fined for contempt.”
Tom looked dazed. But at that moment a hand was laid on his
shoulder, and Tom turned.
“Why,” says he, “thar’s no devil if it ain’t the Colonel. Polly
Ann told me not to let ’em scar’ me, Colonel.”
“And quite right, Tom,” Colonel Clark answered, smiling. He
turned to the judges. "If your Honors please,” said he, “this
gentleman is an old soldier of mine, and unused to the ways of
court. I beg your Honors to excuse him.”
The judges smiled back, and the Colonel led us out of the
building.
“Now, Tom,” said he, after he had given me a nod and a kind
word, “I know this Mr. Colfax, and if you will come into the
tavern this evening after court, we’ll see what can be done. I
have a case of my own at present.”
Tom was very grateful. He spent the remainder of the daylight
hours with other friends of his, shooting at a mark near by,
serenely confident of the result of his case now that Colonel
Clark had a hand in it. Tom being one of the best shots in
Kentucky, he had won two beaver skins before the early autumn
twilight fell. As for me, I had an afternoon of excitement in the
court, fascinated by the marvels of its procedures, by the
impassioned speeches of its advocates, by the gravity of its
judges. Ambition stirred within me.
The big room of the tavern was filled with men in heated talk
over the day’s doings, some calling out for black betty, some for
rum, and some demanding apple toddies. The landlord’s slovenly
negro came in with candles, their feeble rays reenforcing the
firelight and revealing the mud-chinked walls. Tom and I had
barely sat ourselves down at a table in a corner, when in came
Colonel Clark. Beside him was a certain swarthy gentleman whom I
had noticed in the court, a man of some thirty-five years, with a
fine, fleshy face and coal-black hair. His expression was not one
to give us the hope of an amicable settlement, — in fact, he had the
scowl of a thundercloud. He was talking quite angrily, and seemed
not to heed those around him.
“Why the devil should I see the man, Clark?” he was saying.
The Colonel did not answer until they had stopped in front of
us.
“Major Colfax,” said he, “this is Sergeant Tom McChesney, one of
the best friends I have in Kentucky. I think a vast deal of Tom,
Major. He was one of the few that never failed me in the Illinois
campaign. He is as honest as the day; you will find him
plain-spoken if he speaks at all, and I have great hopes that you
will agree. Tom, the Major and I are boyhood friends, and for the
sake of that friendship he has consented to this meeting.”
“I fear that your kind efforts will be useless, Colonel,” Major
Colfax put in, rather tartly. "Mr. McChesney not only ignores my
rights, but was near to hanging my agent.”
“What?” says Colonel Clark.
I glanced at Tom. However helpless he might be in a court, he
could be counted on to stand up stanchly in a personal argument.
His retorts would certainly not be brilliant, but they surely
would be dogged. Major Colfax had begun wrong.
“I reckon ye’ve got no rights that I know on,” said Tom. "I
cleart the land and settled it, and I have a better right to it
nor any man. And I’ve got a grant fer it.”
“A Henderson grant!” cried the Major; "’tis so much worthless
paper.”
“I reckon it’s good enough fer me,” answered Tom. "It come from
those who blazed their way out here and druv the redskins off. I
don’t know nothin’ about this newfangled law, but ’tis a queer
thing to my thinkin’ if them that fit fer a place ain’t got the
fust right to it.”
Major Colfax turned to Colonel Clark with marked impatience.
“I told you it would be useless, Clark,” said he. "I care not a
fig for a few paltry acres, and as God hears me I’m a reasonable
man.” (He did not look it then.) "But I swear by the evangels I’ll
let no squatter have the better of me. I did not serve Virginia
for gold or land, but I lost my fortune in that service, and
before I know it these backwoodsmen will have every acre of my
grant. It’s an old story,” said Mr. Colfax, hotly, “and why the
devil did we fight England if it wasn’t that every man should have
his rights? By God, I’ll not be frightened or wheedled out of
mine. I sent an agent to Kentucky to deal politely and reasonably
with these gentry. What did they do to him? Some of them threw him
out neck and crop. And if I am not mistaken,” said Major Colfax,
fixing a piercing eye upon Tom, “if I am not mistaken, it was this
worthy sergeant of yours who came near to hanging him, and made
the poor devil flee Kentucky for his life.”
This remark brought me near to an untimely laugh at the
remembrance of Mr. Potts, and this though I was far too sober over
the outcome of the conference. Colonel Clark seized hold of a
chair and pushed it under Major Colfax.
“Sit down, gentlemen, we are not so far apart,” said the
Colonel, coolly. The slovenly negro lad passing at that time, he
caught him by the sleeve. "Here, boy, a bowl of toddy, quick. And
mind you brew it strong. Now, Tom,” said he, “what is this fine
tale about a hanging?”
“’Twan’t nothin’,” said Tom.
“You tell me you didn’t try to hang Mr. Potts!” cried Major
Colfax.
“I tell you nothin’,” said Tom, and his jaw was set more
stubbornly than ever.
Major Colfax glanced at Colonel Clark.
“You see!” he said a little triumphantly.
I could hold my tongue no longer.
“Major Colfax is unjust, sir,” I cried. "’Twas Tom saved the man
from hanging.”
“Eh?” says Colonel Clark, turning to me sharply. "So you had a
hand in this, Davy. I might have guessed as much.”
“Who the devil is this?” says Mr. Colfax.
“A sort of ward of mine,” answers the Colonel. "Drummer boy,
financier, strategist, in my Illinois campaign. Allow me to
present to you, Major, Mr. David Ritchie. When my men objected to
marching through ice-skimmed water up to their necks, Mr. Ritchie
showed them how.”
“God bless my soul!” exclaimed the Major, staring at me from
under his black eyebrows, “he was but a child.”
“With an old head on his shoulders,” said the Colonel, and his
banter made me flush.
The negro boy arriving with the toddy, Colonel Clark served out
three generous gourdfuls, a smaller one for me. "Your health, my
friends, and I drink to a peaceful settlement.”
“You may drink to the devil if you like,” says Major Colfax,
glaring at Tom.
“Come, Davy,” said Colonel Clark, when he had taken half the
gourd, “let’s have the tale. I’ll warrant you’re behind this.”
I flushed again, and began by stammering. For I had a great fear
that Major Colfax’s temper would fly into bits when he heard it.
“Well, sir,” said I, “I was grinding corn at the mill when the
man came. I thought him a smooth-mannered person, and he did not
give his business. He was just for wheedling me. ’And was this
McChesney’s mill?’ said he. ’Ay,’ said I. ’Thomas McChesney?’
’Ay,’ said I. Then he was all for praise of Thomas McChesney.
’Where is he?’ said he. ’He is at the far pasture,’ said I,’ and
may be looked for any moment.’ Whereupon he sits down and tries to
worm out of me the business of the mill, the yield of the land.
After that he begins to talk about the great people he knows,
Sevier and Shelby and Robertson and Boone and the like. Ay, and
his intimates, the Randolphs and the Popes and the Colfaxes in
Virginia. ’Twas then I asked him if he knew Colonel Campbell of
Abingdon.”
“And what deviltry was that?” demanded the Colonel, as he dipped
himself more of the toddy.
“I’ll come to it, sir. Yes, Colonel Campbell was his intimate,
and ranted if he did not tarry a week with him at Abingdon on his
journeys. After that he follows me to the cabin, and sees Polly
Ann and Tom and the children on the floor poking a ’possum. ’Ah,’
says he, in his softest voice, ’a pleasant family scene. And this
is Mr. McChesney?’ ’I’m your man,’ says Tom. Then he praised the
mill site and the land all over again. ’Tis good enough for a
farmer,’ says Tom. ’Who holds under Henderson’s grant,’ I cried.
’Twas that you wished to say an hour ago,’ and I saw I had caught
him fair.”
“By the eternal!” cried Colonel Clark, bringing down his fist
upon the table. "And what then?”
I glanced at Major Colfax, but for the life of me I could make
nothing of his look.
“And what did your man say?” said Colonel Clark.
“He called on the devil to bite me, sir,” I answered. The
Colonel put down his gourd and began to laugh. The Major was
looking at me fixedly.
“And what then?” said the Colonel.
“It was then Polly Ann called him a thief to take away the land
Tom had fought for and paid for and tilled. The man was all
politeness once more, said that the matter was unfortunate, and
that a new and good title might be had for a few skins.”
“He said that?” interrupted Major Colfax, half rising in his
chair. "He was a damned scoundrel.”
“So I thought, sir,” I answered.
“The devil you did!” said the Major.
“Tut, Colfax,” said the Colonel, pulling him by the sleeve of
his greatcoat, “sit down and let the lad finish. And then?”
“Mr. Boone had told me of a land agent who had made off with
Colonel Campbell’s silver spoons from Abingdon, and how the
Colonel had ridden east and west after him for a week with a rope
hanging on his saddle. I began to tell this story, and instead of
the description of Mr. Boone’s man, I put in that of Mr. Potts, — in
height some five feet nine, spare, of sallow complexion and a
green greatcoat.”
Major Colfax leaped up in his chair.
“Great Jehovah!” he shouted, “you described the wrong man.”
Colonel Clark roared with laughter, thereby spilling some of his
toddy.
“I’ll warrant he did so,” he cried; "and I’ll warrant your agent
went white as birch bark. Go on, Davy.”
“There’s not a great deal more, sir,” I answered, looking
apprehensively at Major Colfax, who still stood. "The man vowed I
lied, but Tom laid hold of him and was for hurrying him off to
Harrodstown at once.”
“Which would ill have suited your purpose,” put in the Colonel.
"And what did you do with him?”
“We put him in a loft, sir, and then I told Tom that he was not
Campbell’s thief at all. But I had a craving to scare the man out
of Kentucky. So I rode off to the neighbors and gave them the
tale, and bade them come after nightfall as though to hang
Campbell’s thief, which they did, and they were near to smashing
the door trying to get in the cabin. Tom told them the rascal had
escaped, but they must needs come in and have jigs and toddies
until midnight. When they were gone, and we called down the man
from the loft, he was in such a state that he could scarce find
the rungs of the ladder with his feet. He rode away into the
night, and that was the last we heard of him. Tom was not to
blame, sir.”
Colonel Clark was speechless. And when for the moment he would
conquer his mirth, a glance at Major Colfax would set him off
again in laughter. I was puzzled. I thought my Colonel more human
than of old.
“How now, Colfax?” he cried, giving a poke to the Major’s ribs;
"you hold the sequel to this farce.”
The Major’s face was purple, — with what emotion I could not say.
Suddenly he swung full at me.
“Do you mean to tell me that you were the general of this
hoax — you?” he demanded in a strange voice.
“The thing seemed an injustice to me, sir,” I replied in
self-defence, “and the man a rascal.”
“A rascal!” cried the Major, “a knave, a poltroon, a simpleton!
And he came to me with no tale of having been outwitted by a
stripling.” Whereupon Major Colfax began to shake, gently at
first, and presently he was in such a gale of laughter that I
looked on him in amazement, Colonel Clark joining in again. The
Major’s eye rested at length upon Tom, and gradually he grew calm.
“McChesney,” said he, “we’ll have no bickerings in court among
soldiers. The land is yours, and to-morrow my attorney shall give
you a deed of it. Your hand, McChesney.”
The stubbornness vanished from Tom’s face, and there came
instead a dazed expression as he thrust a great, hard hand into
the Major’s.
“’Twan’t the land, sir,” he stammered; "these varmints of
settlers is gittin’ thick as flies in July. ’Twas Polly Ann. I
reckon I’m obleeged to ye, Major.”
“There, there,” said the Major, “I thank the Lord I came to
Kentucky to see for myself. Damn the land. I have plenty more, — and
little else.” He turned quizzically to Colonel Clark, revealing a
line of strong, white teeth. "Suppose we drink a health to your
drummer boy,” said he, lifting up his gourd.
CHAPTER IV.
i cross the mountains once more
“’TIS WHAT ye’ve a right to, Davy,” said Polly Ann, and she
handed me a little buckskin bag on which she had been sewing. I
opened it with trembling fingers, and poured out, chinking on the
table, such a motley collection of coins as was never
seen, — Spanish milled dollars, English sovereigns and crowns and
shillings, paper issues of the Confederacy, and I know not what
else. Tom looked on with a grin, while little Tom and Peggy
reached out their hands in delight, their mother vigorously
blocking their intentions.
“Ye’ve earned it yerself,” said Polly Ann, forestalling my
protest; “’tis what ye got by the mill, and I’ve laid it by bit by
bit for yer eddication.”
“And what do you get?” I cried, striving by feigned anger to
keep the tears back from my eyes. "Have you no family to support?”
“Faith,” she answered, “we have the mill that ye gave us, and
the farm, and Tom’s rifle. I reckon we’ll fare better than ye
think, tho’ we’ll miss ye sore about the place.”
I picked out two sovereigns from the heap, dropped them in the
bag, and thrust it into my hunting shirt.
“There,” said I, my voice having no great steadiness, “not a
penny more. I’ll keep the bag for your sake, Polly Ann, and I’ll
take the mare for Tom’s.”
She had had a song on her lips ever since our coming back from
Danville, seven days agone, a song on her lips and banter on her
tongue, as she made me a new hunting shirt and breeches for the
journey across the mountains. And now with a sudden movement she
burst into tears and flung her arms about my neck.
“Oh, Davy, ’tis no time to be stubborn,” she sobbed, “and
eddication is a costly thing. Ever sence I found ye on the trace,
years ago, I’ve thought of ye one day as a great man. And when ye
come back to us so big and l’arned, I’d wish to be saying with
pride that I helped ye.”
“And who else, Polly Ann?” I faltered, my heart racked with the
parting. "You found me a homeless waif, and you gave me a home and
a father and mother.”
“Davy, ye’ll not forget us when ye’re great, I know ye’ll not.
Tis not in ye.”
She stood back and smiled at me through her tears. The light of
heaven was in that smile, and I have dreamed of it even since age
has crept upon me. Truly, God sets his own mark on the pure in
heart, on the unselfish.
I glanced for the last time around the rude cabin, every timber
of which was dedicated to our sacrifices and our love: the
fireplace with its rough stones, on the pegs the quaint butternut
garments which Polly Ann had stitched, the baby in his bark
cradle, the rough bedstead and the little trundle pushed under
it, — and the very homely odor of the place is dear to me yet.
Despite the rigors and the dangers of my life here, should I ever
again find such happiness and peace in the world? The children
clung to my knees; and with a "God bless ye, Davy, and come back
to us,” Tom squeezed my hand until I winced with pain. I leaped on
the mare, and with blinded eyes rode down the familiar trail, past
the mill, to Harrodsburg.
There Mr. Neville Colfax was waiting to take me across the
mountains.
There is a story in every man’s life, like the kernel in the
shell of a hickory nut. I am ill acquainted with the arts of a
biographer, but I seek to give in these pages little of the shell
and the whole of the kernel of mine. ’Twould be unwise and
tiresome to recount the journey over the bare mountains with my
new friend and benefactor. He was a strange gentleman, now jolly
enough to make me shake with laughter and forget the sorrow of my
parting, now moody for a night and a day; now he was all
sweetness, now all fire; now he was abstemious, now self-indulgent
and prodigal. He had a will like flint, and under it a soft heart.
Cross his moods, and he hated you. I never thought to cross them,
therefore he called me Davy, and his friendliness grew with our
journey. His anger turned against rocks and rivers, landlords and
emigrants, but never against me. And for this I was silently
thankful.
And how had he come to take me over the mountains, and to put me
in the way of studying law? Mindful of the kernel of my story, I
have shortened the chapter to tell you out of the proper place.
Major Colfax had made Tom and me sup with himself and Colonel
Clark at the inn in Danville. And so pleased had the Major
professed himself with my story of having outwitted his agent,
that he must needs have more of my adventures. Colonel Clark gave
him some, and Tom, — his tongue loosed by the toddy, — others. And the
Colonel added to the debt I owed him by suggesting that Major
Colfax take me to Virginia and recommend me to a lawyer there.
“Nay,” cried the Major, “I will do more. I like the lad, for he
is modest despite the way you have paraded him. I have an uncle in
Richmond, Judge Wentworth, to whom I will take him in person. And
when the Judge has done with him, if he is not flayed and tattooed
with Blackstone, you may flay and tattoo me.”
Thus did I break through my environment. And it was settled that
I should meet the Major in seven days at Harrodstown.
Once in the journey did the Major make mention of a subject
which had troubled me.
“Davy,” said he, “Clark has changed. He is not the same man he
was when I saw him in Williamsburg demanding supplies for his
campaign.”
“Virginia has used him shamefully, sir,” I answered, and
suddenly there came flooding to my mind things I had heard the
Colonel say in the campaign.
“Commonwealths have short memories,” said the Major, “they will
accept any sacrifice with a smile. Shakespeare, I believe, speaks
of royal ingratitude — he knew not commonwealths. Clark was
close-lipped once, not given to levity and — to toddy. There, there,
he is my friend as well as yours, and I will prove it by pushing
his cause in Virginia. Is yours Scotch anger? Then the devil fend
me from it. A monarch would have given him fifty thousand acres on
the Wabash, a palace, and a sufficient annuity. Virginia has given
him a sword, eight thousand wild acres to be sure, repudiated the
debts of his army, and left him to starve. Is there no room for a
genius in our infant military establishment?”
At length, as Christmas drew near, we came to Major Colfax’s
seat, some forty miles out of the town of Richmond. It was called
Neville’s Grange, the Major’s grandfather having so named it when
he came out from England some sixty years before. It was a huge,
rambling, draughty house of wood, — mortgaged, so the Major
cheerfully informed me, thanks to the patriotism of the family. At
Neville’s Grange the Major kept a somewhat roisterous bachelor’s
hall. The place was overrun with negroes and dogs, and scarce a
night went by that there was not merrymaking in the house with the
neighbors. The time passed pleasantly enough until one frosty
January morning Major Colfax had a twinge of remembrance, cried
out for horses, took me into Richmond, and presented me to that
very learned and decorous gentleman, Judge Wentworth.
My studies began within the hour of my arrival.
CHAPTER V.
i meet an old bedfellow
I SHALL burden no one with the dry chronicles of a law office.
The acquirement of learning is a slow process in life, and
perchance a slower one in the telling. I lacked not application
during the three years of my stay in Richmond, and to earn my
living I worked at such odd tasks as came my way.
The Judge resembled Major Colfax in but one trait: he was
choleric. But he was painstaking and cautious, and I soon found
out that he looked askance upon any one whom his nephew might
recommend. He liked the Major, but he vowed him to be a roisterer
and spendthrift, and one day, some months after my advent, the
Judge asked me flatly how I came to fall in with Major Colfax. I
told him. At the end of this conversation he took my breath away
by bidding me come to live with him. Like many lawyers of that
time, he had a little house in one corner of his grounds for his
office. It stood under great spreading trees, and there I was wont
to sit through many a summer day wrestling with the authorities.
In the evenings we would have political arguments, for the
Confederacy was in a seething state between the Federalists and
the Republicans over the new Constitution, now ratified. Between
the Federalists and the Jacobins, I would better say, for the
virulence of the French Revolution was soon to be reflected among
the parties on our side. Kentucky, swelled into an unmanageable
territory, was come near to rebellion because the government was
not strong enough to wrest from Spain the free navigation of the
Mississippi.
And yet I yearned to go back, and looked forward eagerly to the
time when I should have stored enough in my head to gain admission
to the bar. I was therefore greatly embarrassed, when my
examinations came, by an offer from Judge Wentworth to stay in
Richmond and help him with his practice. It was an offer not to be
lightly set aside, and yet I had made up my mind. He flew into a
passion because of my desire to return to a wild country of
outlaws and vagabonds.
“Why, damme,” he cried, “Kentucky and this pretty State of
Franklin which desired to chip off from North Carolina are
traitorous places. Disloyal to Congress! Intriguing with a Spanish
minister and the Spanish governor of Louisiana to secede from
their own people and join the King of Spain. Bah!” he exclaimed,
"if our new Federal Constitution is adopted I would hang Jack
Sevier of Franklin and your Kentuckian Wilkinson to the highest
trees west of the mountains.”
I can see the little gentleman as he spoke, his black broadcloth
coat and lace ruffles, his hand clutching the gold head of his
cane, his face screwed up with indignation under his white wig. It
was on a Sunday, and he was standing by the lilac bushes on the
lawn in front of his square brick house.
“David,” said he, more calmly, “I trust I have taught you
something besides the law. I trust I have taught you that a strong
Federal government alone will be the salvation of our country.”
“You cannot blame Kentucky greatly, sir,” said I, feeling that I
must stand up for my friends. "The Federal government has done
little enough for its people, and treated them to a deal of
neglect. They won that western country for themselves with no
Federal nor Virginia or North Carolina troops to help them. No man
east of the mountains knows what that fight has been. No man east
of the mountains knows the horror of that Indian warfare. This
government gives them no protection now. Nay, Congress cannot even
procure for them an outlet for their commerce. They must trade or
perish. Spain closes the Mississippi, arrests our merchants,
seizes their goods, and often throws them into prison. No wonder
they scorn the Congress as weak and impotent.”
The Judge stared at me aghast. It was the first time I had dared
oppose him on this subject.
“What,” he sputtered, “what? You are a Separatist, — you whom I
have received into the bosom of my family!” Seizing the cane at
the middle, he brandished it in my face.
“Don’t misunderstand me, sir,” said I. "You have given me books
to read, and have taught me what may be the destiny of our nation
on this continent. But you must forgive a people whose lives have
been spent in a fierce struggle for their homes, whose families
have nearly all lost some member by massacre, who are separated by
hundreds of miles of wilderness from you.”
He looked at me speechless, and turned and walked into the
house. I thought I had sinned past forgiveness, and I was beyond
description uncomfortable, for he had been like a parent to me.
But the next morning, at half after seven, he walked into the
little office and laid down some gold pieces on my table. Gold was
very scarce in those days.
“They are for your journey, David,” said he. "My only comfort in
your going back is that you may grow up to put some temperance
into their wild heads. I have a commission for you at Jonesboro,
in what was once the unspeakable State of Franklin. You can stop
there on your way to Kentucky.” He drew from his pocket a great
bulky letter, addressed to “Thomas Wright, Esquire,
Barrister-at-law in Jonesboro, North Carolina.” For the good
gentleman could not bring himself to write Franklin.
It was late in September of the year 1788 when I set out on my
homeward way — for Kentucky was home to me. I was going back to
Polly Ann and Tom, and visions of that home-coming rose before my
eyes as I rode. In a packet in my saddle-bags were some dozen
letters which Mr. Wrenn, the schoolmaster at Harrodstown, had writ
at Polly Ann’s bidding. I have the letters yet. For Mr. Wrenn was
plainly an artist, and had set down on the paper the words just as
they had flowed from her heart. Ay, and there was news in the
letters, though not surprising news among those pioneer families
whom God blessed so abundantly. Since David Ritchie McChesney (I
mention the name with pride) had risen above the necessities of a
bark cradle, two more had succeeded him, a brother and a sister. I
spurred my horse onward, and thought impatiently of the weary
leagues between my family and me.
I have often pictured myself on that journey. I was twenty-one
years of age, though one would have called me older. My looks were
nothing to boast of, and I was grown up tall and weedy, so that I
must have made quite a comical sight, with my long legs dangling
on either side of the pony. I wore a suit of gray homespun, and in
my saddle-bags I carried four precious law books, the stock in
trade which my generous patron had given me. But as I mounted the
slopes of the mountains my spirits rose too at the prospect of the
life before me. The woods were all aflame with color, with wine
and amber and gold, and the hills wore the misty mantle of shadowy
blue so dear to my youthful memory. As I left the rude taverns of
a morning and jogged along the heights, I watched the vapors rise
and troll away from the valleys far beneath, and saw great flocks
of ducks and swans and cackling geese darkening the air in their
southward flight. Strange that I fell in with no company, for the
trail leading into the Tennessee country was widened and broadened
beyond belief, and everywhere I came upon blackened fires and
abandoned lean-tos, and refuse bones gnawed by the wolves and
bleached by the weather. I slept in some of these lean-tos, with
my fire going brightly, indifferent to the howl of wolves in chase
or the scream of a panther pouncing on its prey. For I was born of
the wilderness. It had no terrors for me, nor did I ever feel
alone. The great cliffs with their clinging, gnarled trees, the
vast mountains clothed in the motley colors of the autumn, the
sweet and smoky smell of the Indian summer, — all were dear to me.
As I drew near to Jonesboro my thoughts began to dwell upon that
strange and fascinating man who had entertained Polly Ann and Tom
and me so lavishly on our way to Kentucky, — Captain John Sevier.
For he had made a great noise in the world since then, and the
wrath of such men as my late patron was heavy upon him. Yes, John
Sevier, Nollichucky Jack, had been a king in all but name since I
had seen him, the head of such a principality as stirred the blood
to read about. It comprised the Watauga settlement among the
mountains of what is now Tennessee, and was called prosaically (as
is the wont of the Anglo-Saxon) the free State of Franklin. There
were certain conservative and unimaginative souls in this mountain
principality who for various reasons held their old allegiance to
the State of North Carolina. One Colonel Tipton led these loyalist
forces, and armed partisans of either side had for some years
ridden up and down the length of the land, burning and pillaging
and slaying. We in Virginia had heard of two sets of courts in
Franklin, of two sets of legislators. But of late the rumor had
grown persistently that Nollichucky Jack was now a kind of
fugitive, and that he had passed the summer pleasantly enough
fighting Indians in the vicinity of Nick-a-jack Cave.
It was court day as I rode into the little town of Jonesboro,
the air sparkling like a blue diamond over the mountain crests,
and I drew deep into my lungs once more the scent of the frontier
life I had loved so well. In the streets currents of excited men
flowed and backed and eddied, backwoodsmen and farmers in the
familiar hunting shirts of hide or homespun, and lawyers in dress
less rude. A line of horses stood kicking and switching their
tails in front of the log tavern, rough carts and wagons had been
left here and there with their poles on the ground, and between
these, piles of skins were heaped up and bags of corn and grain.
The log meeting-house was deserted, but the court-house was the
centre of such a swirling crowd as I had often seen at
Harrodstown. Now there are brawls and brawls, and I should have
thought with shame of my Kentucky bringing-up had I not perceived
that this was no ordinary court day, and that an unusual
excitement was in the wind.
Tying my horse, and making my way through the press in front of
the tavern door, I entered the common room, and found it stifling,
brawling and drinking going on apace. Scarce had I found a seat
before the whole room was emptied by one consent, all crowding out
of the door after two men who began a rough-and-tumble fight in
the street. I had seen rough-and-tumble fights in Kentucky, and if
I have forborne to speak of them it is because there always has
been within me a loathing for them. And so I sat quietly in the
common room until the landlord came. I asked him if he could
direct me to Mr. Wright’s house, as I had a letter for that
gentleman. His answer was to grin at me incredulously.
“I reckoned you wah’nt from these parts,” said he. "Wright’s-out
o’ town.”
“What is the excitement?” I demanded.
He stared at me.
“Nollichucky Jack’s been heah, in Jonesboro, young man,” said
he.
“What,” I exclaimed, “Colonel Sevier?”
“Ay, Sevier,” he repeated. "With Martin and Tipton and all the
Caroliny men right heah, having a council of mility officers in
the court-house, in rides Jack with his frontier boys like a
whirlwind. He bean’t afeard of ’em, and a bench warrant out ag’in
him for high treason. Never seed sech a recklessness. Never had
sech a jamboree sence I kept the tavern. They was in this here
room most of the day, and they was five fights before they set
down to dinner.”
“And Colonel Tipton?” I said.
“Oh, Tipton,” said he, “he hain’t afeard neither, but he hain’t
got men enough.”
“And where is Sevier now?” I demanded.
“How long hev you ben in town?” was his answer.
I told him.
“Wal,” said he, shifting his tobacco from one sallow cheek to
the other, “I reckon he and his boys rud out just afore you come
in. Mark me,” he added, “when I tell ye there’ll be trouble yet.
Tipton and Martin and the Caroliny folks is burnin’ mad with
Chucky Jack for the murder of Corn Tassel and other peaceful
chiefs. But Jack hez a wild lot with him, — some of the Nollichucky
Cave traders, and there’s one young lad that looks like he was a
gentleman once. I reckon Jack himself wouldn’t like to get into a
fight with him. He’s a wild one. Great Goliah,” he exclaimed,
running to the door, “ef thar ain’t a-goin’ to be another fight!
Never seed sech a day in Jonesboro.”
I likewise ran to the door, and this fight interested me. There
was a great, black-bearded mountaineer-farmer-desperado in the
midst of a circle, pouring out a torrent of abuse at a tall young
man.
“That thar’s Hump Gibson,” said the landlord, genially pointing
out the black-bearded ruffian, “and the young lawyer feller hez
git a jedgment ag’in him. He’s got spunk, but I reckon Hump’ll
t’ar the innards out’n him ef he stands thar a great while.”
“Ye’ll git jedgment ag’in me, ye Caroliny splinter, will ye?”
yelled Mr. Gibson, with an oath. "I’ll pay Bill Wilder the skins
when I git ready, and all the pinhook lawyers in Washington County
won’t budge me a mite.”
“You’ll pay Bill Wilder or go to jail, by the eternal,” cried
the young man, quite as angrily, whereupon I looked upon him with
a mixture of admiration and commiseration, with a gulping
certainty in my throat that I was about to see murder done. He was
a strange young man, with the rare marked look that would compel
even a poor memory to pick him out again. For example, he was very
tall and very slim, with red hair blown every which way over a
high and towering forehead that seemed as long as the face under
it. The face, too, was long, and all freckled by the weather. The
blue eyes held me in wonder, and these blazed with such prodigious
wrath that, if a look could have killed, Hump Gibson would have
been stricken on the spot. Mr. Gibson was, however, very much
alive.
“Skin out o’ here afore I kill ye,” he shouted, and he charged
at the slim young man like a buffalo, while the crowd held its
breath. I, who had looked upon cruel sights in my day, was turning
away with a kind of sickening when I saw the slim young man dodge
the rush. He did more. With two strides of his long legs he
reached the fence, ripped off the topmost rail, and his huge
antagonist, having changed his direction and coming at him with a
bellow, was met with the point of a scantling in the pit of his
stomach, and Mr. Gibson fell heavily to the ground. It had all
happened in a twinkling, and there was a moment’s lull while the
minds of the onlookers needed readjustment, and then they gave
vent to ecstasies of delight.
“Great Goliah!” cried the landlord, breathlessly, “he shet him
up jest like a jack-knife.”
Awe-struck, I looked at the tall young man, and he was the very
essence of wrath. Unmindful of the plaudits, he stood brandishing
the fence-rail over the great, writhing figure on the ground. And
he was slobbering. I recall that this fact gave a twinge to
something in my memory.
“Come on, Hump Gibson,” he cried, “come on!” — at which the crowd
went wild with pure joy. Witticisms flew.
“Thought ye was goin’ to eat ’im up, Hump?” said a friend.
“Ye ain’t hed yer meal yet, Hump,” reminded another.
Mr. Hump Gibson arose slowly out of the dust, yet he did not
stand straight.
“Come on, come on!” cried the young lawyer-fellow, and he thrust
the point of the rail within a foot of Mr. Gibson’s stomach.
“Come on, Hump!” howled the crowd, but Mr. Gibson stood
irresolute. He lacked the supreme test of courage which was
demanded on this occasion. Then he turned and walked away very
slowly, as though his pace might mitigate in some degree the shame
of his retreat. The young man flung away the fence-rail, and,
thrusting aside the overzealous among his admirers, he strode past
me into the tavern, his anger still hot.
“Hooray fer Jackson!” they shouted. "Hooray fer Andy Jackson!”
Andy Jackson! Then I knew. Then I remembered a slim, wild,
sandy-haired boy digging his toes in the red mud long ago at the
Waxhaws Settlement. And I recalled with a smile my own fierce
struggle at the schoolhouse with the same boy, and how his
slobbering had been my salvation. I turned and went in after him
with the landlord, who was rubbing his hands with glee.
“I reckon Hump won’t come crowin’ round heah any more co’t days,
Mr. Jackson,” said our host.
But Mr. Jackson swept the room with his eyes and then glared at
the landlord so that he gave back.
“Where’s my man?” he demanded.
“Your man, Mr. Jackson?” stammered the host.
“Great Jehovah!” cried Mr. Jackson, “I believe he’s afraid to
race. He had a horse that could show heels to my Nancy, did he?
And he’s gone, you say?”
A light seemed to dawn on the landlord’s countenance.
“God bless ye, Mr. Jackson!” he cried, “ye don’t mean that young
daredevil that was with Sevier?”
“With Sevier?” says Jackson.
“Ay,” says the landlord; "he’s been a-fightin with Sevier all
summer, and I reckon he ain’t afeard of nothin’ any more than you.
Wait — his name was Temple — Nick Temple, they called him.”
“Nick Temple!” I cried, starting forward.
“Where’s he gone?” said Mr. Jackson. "He was going to bet me a
six-forty he has at Nashboro that his horse could beat mine on the
Greasy Cove track. Where’s he gone?”
“Gone!” said the landlord, apologetically, “Nollichucky Jack and
his boys left town an hour ago.”
“Is he a man of honor or isn’t he?” said Mr. Jackson, fiercely.
“Lord, sir, I only seen him once, but I’d stake my oath on it.
“Do you mean to say Mr. Temple has been here — Nicholas Temple?” I
said.
The bewildered landlord turned towards me helplessly.
“Who the devil are you, sir?” cried Mr. Jackson.
“Tell me what this Mr. Temple was like,” said I.
The landlord’s face lighted up.
“Faith, a thoroughbred hoss,” says he; "sech nostrils, and sech
a gray eye with the devil in it fer go — yellow ha’r, and ez tall ez
Mr. Jackson heah.”
“And you say he’s gone off again with Sevier?”
“They rud into town" (he lowered his voice, for the room was
filling), “snapped their fingers at Tipton and his warrant, and
rud out ag’in. My God, but that was like Nollichucky Jack. Say,
stranger, when your Mr. Temple smiled — "
“He is the man!” I cried; "tell me where to find him.”
Mr. Jackson, who had been divided between astonishment and
impatience and anger, burst out again.
“What the devil do you mean by interfering with my business,
sir?”
“Because it is my business too,” I answered, quite as testily;
"my claim on Mr. Temple is greater than yours.”
“By Jehovah!” cried Jackson, “come outside, sir, come outside!”
The landlord backed away, and the men in the tavern began to
press around us expectantly.
“Gallop into him, Andy!” cried one.
“Don’t let him git near no fences, stranger,” said another.
Mr. Jackson turned on this man with such truculence that he
edged away to the rear of the room.
“Step out, sir,” said Mr. Jackson, starting for the door before
I could reply. I followed perforce, not without misgivings, the
crowd pushing eagerly after. Before we reached the dusty street
Jackson began pulling off his coat. In a trice the shouting
onlookers had made a ring, and we stood facing each other, he in
his shirt-sleeves.
“We’ll fight fair,” said he, his lips wetting.
“Very good,” said I, “if you are still accustomed to this hasty
manner. You have not asked my name, my standing, nor my reasons
for wanting Mr. Temple.”
I know not whether it was what I said that made him stare, or
how I said it.
“Pistols, if you like,” said he.
“No,” said I; "I am in a hurry to find Mr. Temple. I fought you
this way once, and it’s quicker.”
“You fought me this way once?” he repeated. The noise of the
crowd was hushed, and they drew nearer to hear.
“Come, Mr. Jackson,” said I, “you are a lawyer and a gentleman,
and so am I. I do not care to be beaten to a pulp, but I am not
afraid of you. And I am in a hurry. If you will step back into the
tavern, I will explain to you my reasons for wishing to get to Mr.
Temple.”
Mr. Jackson stared at me the more.
“By the eternal,” said he, “you are a cool man. Give me my
coat,” he shouted to the bystanders, and they helped him on with
it. "Now,” said he, as they made to follow him, “keep back. I
would talk to this gentleman. By the heavens,” he cried, when he
had gained the room, “I believe you are not afraid of me. I saw it
in your eyes.”
Then I laughed.
“Mr. Jackson,” said I, “doubtless you do not remember a homeless
boy named David whom you took to your uncle’s house in the
Waxhaws — "
“I do,” he exclaimed, “as I live I do. Why, we slept together.”
“And you stumped your toe getting into bed and swore,” said I.
At that he laughed so heartily that the landlord came running
across the room.
“And we fought together at the Old Fields School. Are you that
boy?” and he scanned me again. "By God, I believe you are.”
Suddenly his face clouded once more.
“But what about Temple?” said he.
“Ah,” I answered, “I come to that quickly. Mr. Temple is my
cousin. After I left your uncle’s house my father took me to
Charlestown.”
“Is he a Charlestown Temple?” demanded Mr. Jackson. "For I spent
some time gambling and horse-racing with the gentry there, and I
know many of them. I was a wild lad" (I repeat his exact words),
"and I ran up a bill in Charlestown that would have filled a folio
volume. Faith, all I had left me was the clothes on my back and a
good horse. I made up my mind one night that if I could pay my
debts and get out of Charlestown I would go into the back country
and study law and sober down. There was a Mr. Braiden in the
ordinary who staked me two hundred dollars at rattle-and-snap
against my horse. Gad, sir, that was providence. I won. I left
Charlestown with honor, I studied law at Salisbury in North
Carolina, and I have come here to practise it.”
“You seem to have the talent,” said I, smiling at the
remembrance of the Hump Gibson incident.
“That is my history in a nutshell,” said Mr. Jackson.
“And now,” he added, “since you are Mr. Temple’s cousin and
friend and an old acquaintance of mine to boot, I will tell you
where I think he is.”
“Where is that?” I asked eagerly.
“I’ll stake a cowbell that Sevier will stop at the Widow
Brown’s,” he replied. "I’ll put you on the road. But mind you, you
are to tell Mr. Temple that he is to come back here and race me at
Greasy Cove.”
“I’ll warrant him to come,” said I.
Whereupon we left the inn together, more amicably than before.
Mr. Jackson had a thoroughbred horse near by that was a pleasure
to see, and my admiration of his mount seemed to set me as firmly
in Mr. Jackson’s esteem again as that gentleman himself sat in the
saddle. He was as good as his word, rode out with me some distance
on the road, and reminded me at the last that Nick was to race
him.
IT WAS not to my credit that I should have lost the trail, after
Mr. Jackson put me straight. But the night was dark, the country
unknown to me, and heavily wooded and mountainous. In addition to
these things my mind ran like fire. My thoughts sometimes flew
back to the wondrous summer evening when I trod the Nollichucky
trace with Tom and Polly Ann, when I first looked down upon the
log palace of that prince of the border, John Sevier. Well I
remembered him, broad-shouldered, handsome, gay, a courtier in
buckskin. Small wonder he was idolized by the Watauga settlers,
that he had been their leader in the struggle of Franklin for
liberty. And small wonder that Nick Temple should be in his
following.
Nick! My mind was in a torment concerning him. What of his
mother? Should I speak of having seen her? I went blindly through
the woods for hours after the night fell, my horse stumbling and
weary, until at length I came to a lonely clearing on the mountain
side, and a fierce pack of dogs dashed barking at my horse’s
heels. There was a dark cabin ahead, indistinct in the starlight,
and there I knocked until a gruff voice answered me and a tousled
man came to the door. Yes, I had missed the trail. He shook his
head when I asked for the Widow Brown’s, and bade me share his bed
for the night. No, I would go on, I was used to the backwoods.
Thereupon he thawed a little, kicked the dogs, and pointed to
where the mountain dipped against the star-studded sky. There was
a trail there which led direct to the Widow Brown’s, if I could
follow it. So I left him.
Once the fear had settled deeply of missing Nick at the Widow
Brown’s, I put my mind on my journey, and thanks to my early
training I was able to keep the trail. It doubled around the
spurs, forded stony brooks in diagonals, and often in the darkness
of the mountain forest I had to feel for the blazes on the trees.
There was no making time. I gained the notch with the small hours
of the morning, started on with the descent, crisscrossing,
following a stream here and a stream there, until at length the
song of the higher waters ceased and I knew that I was in the
valley. Suddenly there was no crown-cover over my head. I had
gained the road once more, and I followed it hopefully, avoiding
the stumps and the deep wagon ruts where the ground was spongy.
The morning light revealed a milky mist through which the trees
showed like phantoms. Then there came stains upon the mist of
royal purple, of scarlet, of yellow like a mandarin’s robe, peeps
of deep blue fading into azure as the mist lifted. The fiery eye
of the sun was cocked over the crest, and beyond me I saw a house
with its logs all golden brown in the level rays, the withered
cornstalks orange among the blackened stumps. My horse stopped of
his own will at the edge of the clearing. A cock crew, a lean
hound prostrate on the porch of the house rose to his haunches,
sniffed, growled, leaped down, and ran to the road and sniffed
again. I listened, startled, and made sure of the distant ring of
many hoofs. And yet I stayed there, irresolute. Could it be Tipton
and his men riding from Jonesboro to capture Sevier? The
hoof-beats grew louder, and then the hound in the road gave tongue
to the short, sharp bark that is the call to arms. Other dogs,
hitherto unseen, took up the cry, and turning in my saddle I saw a
body of men riding hard at me through the alley in the forest. At
their head, on a heavy, strong-legged horse, was one who might
have stood for the figure of turbulence, and I made no doubt that
this was Colonel Tipton himself, — Colonel Tipton, once
secessionist, now champion of the Old North State and arch-enemy
of John Sevier. At sight of me he reined up so violently that his
horse went back on his haunches, and the men behind were near
overriding him.
“Look out, boys,” he shouted, with a fierce oath, “they’ve got
guards out!” He flung back one hand to his holster for a pistol,
while the other reached for the powder flask at his belt. He
primed the pan, and, seeing me immovable, set his horse forward at
an amble, his pistol at the cock.
“Who in hell are you?” he cried.
“A traveller from Virginia,” I answered.
“And what are you doing here?” he demanded, with another oath.
“I have just this moment come here,” said I, as calmly as I
might. "I lost the trail in the darkness.”
He glared at me, purpling, perplexed.
“Is Sevier there?” said he, pointing at the house.
“I don’t know,” said I.
Tipton turned to his men, who were listening.
“Surround the house,” he cried, “and watch this fellow.”
I rode on perforce towards the house with Tipton and three
others, while his men scattered over the corn-field and cursed the
dogs. And then we saw in the open door the figure of a woman
shading her eyes with her hand. We pulled up, five of us, before
the porch in front of her.
“Good morning, Mrs. Brown,” said Tipton, gruffly.
“Good morning, Colonel,” answered the widow.
Tipton leaped from his horse, flung the bridle to a companion,
and put his foot on the edge of the porch to mount. Then a strange
thing happened. The lady turned deftly, seized a chair from
within, and pulled it across the threshold. She sat herself down
firmly, an expression on her face which hinted that the late
lamented Mr. Brown had been a dominated man. Colonel Tipton
stopped, staggering from the very impetus of his charge, and gazed
at her blankly.
“I have come for Colonel Sevier,” he blurted. And then, his
anger rising, “I will have no trifling, ma’am. He is in this
house.”
“La! you don’t tell me,” answered the widow, in a tone that was
wholly conversational.
“He is in this house,” shouted the Colonel.
“I reckon you’ve guessed wrong, Colonel,” said the widow.
There was an awkward pause until Tipton heard a titter behind
him. Then his wrath exploded.
“I have a warrant against the scoundrel for high treason,” he
cried, “and, by God, I will search the house and serve it.”
Still the widow sat tight. The Rock of Ages was neither more
movable nor calmer than she.
“Surely, Colonel, you would not invade the house of an
unprotected female.”
The Colonel, evidently with a great effort, throttled his wrath
for the moment. His new tone was apologetic but firm.
“I regret to have to do so, ma’am,” said he, “but both sexes are
equal before the law.”
“The law!” repeated the widow, seemingly tickled at the word.
She smiled indulgently at the Colonel. "What a pity, Mr. Tipton,
that the law compels you to arrest such a good friend of yours as
Colonel Sevier. What self-sacrifice, Colonel Tipton! What
nobility!”
There was a second titter behind him, whereat he swung round
quickly, and the crimson veins in his face looked as if they must
burst. He saw me with my hand over my mouth.
“You warned him, damn you!” he shouted, and turning again leaped
to the porch and tried to squeeze past the widow into the house.
“How dare you, sir?” she shrieked, giving him a vigorous push
backwards. The four of us, his three men and myself, laughed
outright. Tipton’s rage leaped its bounds. He returned to the
attack again and again, and yet at the crucial moment his courage
would fail him and he would let the widow thrust him back.
Suddenly I became aware that there were two new spectators of this
comedy. I started and looked again, and was near to crying out at
sight of one of them. The others did cry out, but Tipton paid no
heed.
Ten years had made his figure more portly, but I knew at once
the man in the well-fitting hunting shirt, with the long hair
flowing to his shoulders, with the keen, dark face and courtly
bearing and humorous eyes. Yes, humorous even now, for he stood,
smiling at this comedy played by his enemy, unmindful of his
peril. The widow saw him before Tipton did, so intent was he on
the struggle.
“Enough!” she cried, “enough, John Tipton!” Tipton drew back
involuntarily, and a smile broadened on the widow’s face. "Shame
on you for doubting a lady’s word! Allow me to present to
you — Colonel Sevier.”
Tipton turned, stared as a man might who sees a ghost, and broke
into such profanity as I have seldom heard.
“By the eternal God, John Sevier,” he shouted, “I’ll hang you to
the nearest tree!”
Colonel Sevier merely made a little ironical bow and looked at
the gentleman beside him.
“I have surrendered to Colonel Love,” he said.
Tipton snatched from his belt the pistol which he might have
used on me, and there flashed through my head the thought that
some powder might yet be held in its pan. We cried out, all of us,
his men, the widow, and myself, — all save Sevier, who stood
quietly, smiling. Suddenly, while we waited for murder, a tall
figure shot out of the door past the widow, the pistol flew out of
Tipton’s hand, and Tipton swung about with something like a
bellow, to face Mr. Nicholas Temple.
Well I knew him! And oddly enough at that time Riddle’s words of
long ago came to me, “God help the woman you love or the man you
fight.” How shall I describe him? He was thin even to seeming
frailness, — yet it was the frailness of the race-horse. The golden
hair, sun-tanned, awry across his forehead, the face the same thin
and finely cut face of the boy. The gray eyes held an anger that
did not blaze; it was far more dangerous than that. Colonel John
Tipton looked, and as I live he recoiled.
“If you touch him, I’ll kill you,” said Mr. Temple. Nor did he
say it angrily. I marked for the first time that he held a pistol
in his slim fingers. What Tipton might have done when he swung to
his new bearings is mere conjecture, for Colonel Sevier himself
stepped up on the porch, laid his hand on Temple’s arm, and spoke
to him in a low tone. What he said we didn’t hear. The astonishing
thing was that neither of them for the moment paid any attention
to the infuriated man beside them. I saw Nick’s expression change.
He smiled, — the smile the landlord had described, the smile that
made men and women willing to die for him. After that Colonel
Sevier stooped down and picked up the pistol from the floor of the
porch and handed it with a bow to Tipton, butt first. Tipton took
it, seemingly without knowing why, and at that instant a negro boy
came around the house, leading a horse. Sevier mounted it without
a protest from any one.
“I am ready to go with you, gentlemen,” he said.
Colonel Tipton slipped his pistol back into his belt, stepped
down from the porch, and leaped into his saddle, and he and his
men rode off into the stump-lined alley in the forest that was
called a road. Nick stood beside the widow, staring after them
until they had disappeared.
“My horse, boy!” he shouted to the gaping negro, who vanished on
the errand.
“What will you do, Mr. Temple?” asked the widow.
“Rescue him, ma’am,” cried Nick, beginning to pace up and down.
"I’ll ride to Turner’s. Cozby and Evans are there, and before
night we shall have made Jonesboro too hot to hold Tipton and his
cutthroats.”
“La, Mr. Temple,” said the widow, with unfeigned admiration, “I
never saw the like of you. But I know John Tipton, and he’ll have
Colonel Sevier started for North Carolina before our boys can get
to Jonesboro.”
“Then we’ll follow,” says Nick, beginning to pace again.
Suddenly, at a cry from the widow, he stopped and stared at me, a
light in his eye like a point of steel. His hand slipped to his
waist.
“A spy,” he said, and turned and smiled at the lady, who was
watching him with a kind of fascination; "but damnably cool,” he
continued, looking at me. "I wonder if he thinks to outride me on
that beast? Look you, sir,” he cried, as Mrs. Brown’s negro came
back struggling with a deep-ribbed, high-crested chestnut that was
making half circles on his hind legs, “I’ll give you to the edge
of the woods, and lay you a six-forty against a pair of moccasins
that you never get back to Tipton.”
“God forbid that I ever do,” I answered fervently.
“What,” he exclaimed, “and you here with him on this sneak’s
errand!”
“I am here with him on no errand,” said I. "He and his crew came
on me a quarter of an hour since at the edge of the clearing. Mr.
Temple, I am here to find you, and to save time I will ride with
you.”
“Egad, you’ll have to ride like the devil then,” said he, and he
stooped and snatched the widow’s hand and kissed it with a daring
gallantry that I had thought to find in him. He raised his eyes to
hers.
“Good-by, Mr. Temple,” she said, — there was a tremor in her
voice, — "and may you save our Jack!”
He snatched the bridle from the boy, and with one leap he was on
the rearing, wheeling horse. "Come on,” he cried to me, and,
waving his hat at the lady on the porch, he started off with a
gallop up the trail in the opposite direction from that which
Tipton’s men had taken.
All that I saw of Mr. Nicholas Temple on that ride to Turner’s
was his back, and presently I lost sight of that. In truth, I
never got to Turner’s at all, for I met him coming back at the
wind’s pace, a huge, swarthy, determined man at his side and four
others spurring after, the spume dripping from the horses’ mouths.
They did not so much as look at me as they passed, and there was
nothing left for me to do but to turn my tired beast and follow at
any pace I could make towards Jonesboro.
It was late in the afternoon before I reached the town, the town
set down among the hills like a caldron boiling over with the
wrath of Franklin. The news of the capture of their beloved Sevier
had flown through the mountains like seeds on the autumn wind, and
from north, south, east, and west the faithful were coming in,
cursing Tipton and Carolina as they rode.
I tethered my tired beast at the first picket, and was no sooner
on my feet than I was caught in the hurrying stream of the crowd
and fairly pushed and beaten towards the court-house. Around it a
thousand furious men were packed. I heard cheering, hoarse and
fierce cries, threats and imprecations, and I knew that they were
listening to oratory. I was suddenly shot around the corner of a
house, saw the orator himself, and gasped.
It was Nicholas Temple. There was something awe-impelling in the
tall, slim, boyish figure that towered above the crowd, in the
finely wrought, passionate face, in the voice charged with such an
anger as is given to few men.
“What has North Carolina done for Franklin?” he cried.
"Protected her? No. Repudiated her? Yes. You gave her to the
Confederacy for a war debt, and the Confederacy flung her back.
You shook yourselves free from Carolina’s tyranny, and traitors
betrayed you again. And now they have betrayed your leader. Will
you avenge him, or will you sit down like cowards while they hang
him for treason?”
His voice was drowned, but he stood immovable with arms folded
until there was silence again.
“Will you rescue him?” he cried, and the roar rose again. "Will
you avenge him? By to-morrow we shall have two thousand here.
Invade North Carolina, humble her, bring her to her knees, and
avenge John Sevier!”
Pandemonium reigned. Hats were flung in the air, rifles fired,
shouts and curses rose and blended into one terrifying note.
Gradually, in the midst of this mad uproar, the crowd became aware
that another man was standing upon the stump from which Nicholas
Temple had leaped. "Cozby!” some one yelled, “Cozby!” The cry was
taken up. "Huzzay for Cozby! He’ll lead us into Caroliny.” He was
the huge, swarthy man I had seen riding hard with Nick that
morning. A sculptor might have chosen his face and frame for a
type of the iron-handed leader of pioneers. Will was supreme in
the great features, — inflexible, indomitable will. His hunting
shirt was open across his great chest, his black hair fell to his
shoulders, and he stood with a compelling hand raised for silence.
And when he spoke, slowly, resonantly, men fell back before his
words.
“I admire Mr. Temple’s courage, and above all his loyalty to our
beloved General,” said Major Cozby. "But Mr. Temple is young, and
the heated counsels of youth must not prevail. My friends, in
order to save Jack Sevier we must be moderate.”
His voice, strong as it was, was lost. "To hell with
moderation!” they shouted. "Down with North Carolina! We’ll fight
her!”
He got silence again by the magnetic strength he had in him.
“Very good,” he said, “but get your General first. If we lead
you across the mountains now, his blood will be upon your heads.
No man is a better friend to Jack Sevier than I. Leave his rescue
to me, and I will get him for you.” He paused, and they were
stilled perforce. "I will get him for you,” he repeated slowly,
"or North Carolina will pay for the burial of James Cozby.”
There was an instant when they might have swung either way.
“How will ye do it?” came in a thin, piping voice from somewhere
near the stump. It may have been this that turned their minds.
Others took up the question, “How will ye do it, Major Cozby?”
“I don’t know,” cried the Major, “I don’t know. And if I did
know, I wouldn’t tell you. But I will get Nollichucky Jack if I
have to burn Morganton and rake the General out of the cinders!”
Five hundred hands flew up, five hundred voices cried, “I’m with
ye, Major Cozby!” But the Major only shook his head and smiled.
What he said was lost in the roar. Fighting my way forward, I saw
him get down from the stump, put his hand kindly on Nick’s
shoulder, and lead him into the court-house. They were followed by
a score of others, and the door was shut behind them.
It was then I bethought myself of the letter to Mr. Wright, and
I sought for some one who would listen to my questions as to his
whereabouts. At length the man himself was pointed out to me,
haranguing an excited crowd of partisans in front of his own gate.
Some twenty minutes must have passed before I could get any word
with him. He was a vigorous little man, with black eyes like
buttons, he wore brown homespun and white stockings, and his hair
was clubbed. When he had yielded the ground to another orator, I
handed him the letter. He drew me aside, read it on the spot, and
became all hospitality at once. The town was full, and though he
had several friends staying in his house I should join them. Was
my horse fed? Dinner had been forgotten that day, but would I
enter and partake? In short, I found myself suddenly provided for,
and I lost no time in getting my weary mount into Mr. Wright’s
little stable. And then I sat down, with several other gentlemen,
at Mr. Wright’s board, where there was much guessing as to Major
Cozby’s plan.
“No other man west of the mountains could have calmed that crowd
after that young daredevil Temple had stirred them up,” declared
Mr. Wright.
I ventured to say that I had business with Mr. Temple.
“Faith, then, I will invite him here,” said my host. "But I warn
you, Mr. Ritchie, that he is a trigger set on the hair. If he does
not fancy you, he may quarrel with you and shoot you. And he is in
no temper to be trifled with to-day.”
“I am not an easy person to quarrel with,” I answered.
“To look at you, I shouldn’t say that you were,” said he. "We
are going to the court-house, and I will see if I can get a word
with the young Hotspur and send him to you. Do you wait here.”
I waited on the porch as the day waned. The tumult of the place
had died down, for men were gathering in the houses to discuss and
conjecture. And presently, sauntering along the street in a
careless fashion, his spurs trailing in the dust, came Nicholas
Temple. He stopped before the house and stared at me with a fine
insolence, and I wondered whether I myself had not been too hasty
in reclaiming him. A greeting died on my lips.
“Well, sir,” he said, “so you are the gentleman who has been
dogging me all day.”
“I dog no one, Mr. Temple,” I replied bitterly.
“We’ll not quibble about words,” said he. "Would it be
impertinent to ask your business — and perhaps your name?”
“Did not Mr. Wright give you my name?” I exclaimed.
“He might have mentioned it, I did not hear. Is it of such
importance?”
At that I lost my temper entirely.
“It may be, and it may not,” I retorted. "I am David Ritchie.”
He changed before my eyes as he stared at me, and then, ere I
knew it, he had me by both arms, crying out: —
“David Ritchie! My Davy — who ran away from me — and we were going
to Kentucky together. Oh, I have never forgiven you,” — the smile
that there was no resisting belied his words as he put his face
close to mine — "I never will forgive you. I might have known
you — you’ve grown, but I vow you’re still an old man, — Davy, you
renegade. And where the devil did you run to?”
“Kentucky,” I said, laughing.
“Oh, you traitor — and I trusted you. I loved you, Davy. Do you
remember how I clung to you in my sleep? And when I woke up, the
world was black. I followed your trail down the drive and to the
cross-roads — "
“It was not ingratitude, Nick,” I said; "you were all I had in
the world.” And then I faltered, the sadness of that far-off time
coming over me in a flood, and the remembrance of his generous
sorrow for me.
“And how the devil did you track me to the Widow Brown’s?” he
demanded, releasing me.
“A Mr. Jackson had a shrewd notion you were there. And by the
way, he was in a fine temper because you had skipped a race with
him.”
“That sorrel-topped, lantern-headed Mr. Jackson?” said Nick.
"He’ll be killed in one of his fine tempers. Damn a man who can’t
keep his temper. I’ll race him, of course. And where are you bound
now, Davy?”
“For Louisville, in Kentucky, at the Falls of the Ohio. It is a
growing place, and a promising one for a young man in the legal
profession to begin life.”
“When do you leave?” said he.
“To-morrow morning, Nick,” said I. "You wanted once to go to
Kentucky; why not come with me?”
His face clouded.
“I do not budge from this town,” said he, “I do not budge until
I hear that Jack Sevier is safe. Damn Cozby! If he had given me my
way, we should have been forty miles from here by this. I’ll tell
you. Cozby is even now picking five men to go to Morganton and
steal Sevier, and he puts me off with a kind word. He’ll not have
me, he says.”
“He thinks you too hot. It needs discretion and an old head,”
said I.
“Egad, then, I’ll commend you to him,” said Nick.
“Now,” I said, “it’s time for you to tell me something of
yourself, and how you chanced to come into this country.”
“’Twas Darnley’s fault,” said Nick.
“Darnley!” I exclaimed; "he whom you got into the duel with — " I
stopped abruptly, with a sharp twinge of remembrance that was like
a pain in my side. ’Twas Nick took up the name.
“With Harry Riddle.” He spoke quietly, that was the terrifying
part of it. "David, I’ve looked for that man in Italy and France,
I’ve scoured London for him, and, by God, I’ll find him before he
dies. And when I do find him I swear to you that there will be no
such thing as time wasted, or mercy.”
I shuddered. In all my life I had never known such a moment of
indecision. Should I tell him? My conscience would give me no
definite reply. The question had haunted me all the night, and I
had lost my way in consequence, nor had the morning’s ride from
the Widow Brown’s sufficed to bring me to a decision. Of what use
to tell him? Would Riddle’s death mend matters? The woman loved
him, that had been clear to me; yet, by telling Nick what I knew I
might induce him to desist from his search, and if I did not tell,
Nick might some day run across the trail, follow it up, take
Riddle’s life, and lose his own. The moment, made for confession
as it was, passed.
“They have ruined my life,” said Nick. "I curse him, and I curse
her.”
“Hold!” I cried; "she is your mother.”
“And therefore I curse her the more,” he said. "You know what
she is, you’ve tasted of her charity, and you are my father’s
nephew. If you have been without experience, I will tell you what
she is. A common — " I reached out and put my hand across his mouth.
“Silence!” I cried; "you shall say no such thing. And have you
not manhood enough to make your own life for yourself?”
“Manhood!” he repeated, and laughed. It was a laugh that I did
not like. "They made a man of me, my parents. My father played
false with the Rebels and fled to England for his reward. A year
after he went I was left alone at Temple Bow to the tender mercies
of the niggers. Mr. Mason came back and snatched what was left of
me. He was a good man; he saved me an annuity out of the estate,
he took me abroad after the war on a grand tour, and died of a
fever in Rome. I made my way back to Charlestown, and there I
learned to gamble, to hold liquor like a gentleman, to run horses
and fight like a gentleman. We were speaking of Darnley,” he said.
“Yes, of Darnley,” I repeated.
“The devil of a man,” said Nick; "do you remember him, with the
cracked voice and fat calves?”
At any other time I should have laughed at the recollection.
“Darnley turned Whig, became a Continental colonel, and got a
grant out here in the Cumberland country of three thousand acres.
And now I own it.”
“You own it!” I exclaimed.
“Rattle-and-snap,” said Nick; "I played him for the land at the
ordinary one night, and won it. It is out here near a place called
Nashboro, where this wild, long-faced Mr. Jackson says he is going
soon. I crossed the mountains to have a look at it, fell in with
Nollichucky Jack, and went off with him for a summer campaign.
There’s a man for you, Davy,” he cried, “a man to follow through
hell-fire. If they touch a hair of his head we’ll sack the State
of North Carolina from Morganton to the sea.”
“But the land?” I asked.
“Oh, a fig for the land,” answered Nick; "as soon as Nollichucky
Jack is safe I’ll follow you into Kentucky.” He slapped me on the
knee. "Egad, Davy, it seems like a fairy tale. We always said we
were going to Kentucky, didn’t we? What is the name of the place
you are to startle with your learning and calm by your example?”
“Louisville,” I answered, laughing, “by the Falls of the Ohio.”
“I shall turn up there when Jack Sevier is safe and I have won
some more land from Mr. Jackson. We’ll have a rare old time
together, though I have no doubt you can drink me under the table.
Beware of these sober men. Egad, Davy, you need only a woolsack to
become a full-fledged judge. And now tell me how fortune has
buffeted you.”
It was my second night without sleep, for we sat burning candles
in Mr. Wright’s house until the dawn, making up the time which we
had lost away from each other.
WHEN LEFT to myself, I was wont to slide into the commonplace;
and where my own dull life intrudes to clog the action I cut it
down here and pare it away there until I am merely explanatory,
and not too much in evidence. I rode out the Wilderness Trail,
fell in with other travellers, was welcomed by certain old
familiar faces at Harrodstown, and pressed on. I have a vivid
recollection of a beloved, vigorous figure swooping out of a cabin
door and scattering a brood of children right and left. "Polly
Ann!” I said, and she halted, trembling.
“Tom,” she cried, “Tom, it’s Davy come back,” and Tom himself
flew out of the door, ramrod in one hand and rifle in the other.
Never shall I forget them as they stood there, he grinning with
sheer joy as of yore, and she, with her hair flying and her blue
gown snapping in the wind, in a tremor between tears and laughter.
I leaped to the ground, and she hugged me in her arms as though I
had been a child, calling my name again and again, and little Tom
pulling at the skirts of my coat. I caught the youngster by the
collar.
“Polly Ann,” said I, “he’s grown to what I was when you picked
me up, a foundling.”
“And now it’s little Davy no more,” she answered, swept me a
courtesy, and added, with a little quiver in her voice, “ye are a
gentleman now.”
“My heart is still where it was,” said I.
“Ay, ay,” said Tom, “I’m sure o’ that, Davy.”
I was with them a fortnight in the familiar cabin, and then I
took up my journey northward, heavy at leaving again, but
promising to see them from time to time. For Tom was often at the
Falls when he went a-scouting into the Illinois country. It was,
as of old, Polly Ann who ran the mill and was the real
bread-winner of the family.
Louisville was even then bursting with importance, and as I rode
into it, one bright November day, I remembered the wilderness I
had seen here not ten years gone when I had marched hither with
Captain Harrod’s company to join Clark on the island. It was even
then a thriving little town of log and clapboard houses and
schools and churches, and wise men were saying of it — what Colonel
Clark had long ago predicted — that it would become the first city
of commercial importance in the district of Kentucky.
I do not mean to give you an account of my struggles that winter
to obtain a foothold in the law. The time was a heyday for young
barristers, and troubles in those early days grew as plentifully
in Kentucky as corn. In short, I got a practice, for Colonel Clark
was here to help me, and, thanks to the men who had gone to
Kaskaskia and Vincennes, I had a fairly large acquaintance in
Kentucky. I hired rooms behind Mr. Crede’s store, which was famed
for the glass windows which had been fetched all the way from
Philadelphia. Mr. Crede was the embodiment of the enterprising
spirit of the place, and often of an evening he called me in to
see the new fashionable things his barges had brought down the
Ohio. The next day certain young sparks would drop into my room to
waylay the belles as they came to pick a costume to be worn at Mr.
Nickle’s dancing school, or at the ball at Fort Finney.
The winter slipped away, and one cool evening in May there came
a negro to my room with a note from Colonel Clark, bidding me sup
with him at the tavern and meet a celebrity.
I put on my best blue clothes that I had brought with me from
Richmond, and repaired expectantly to the tavern about eight of
the clock, pushed through the curious crowd outside, and entered
the big room where the company was fast assembling. Against the
red blaze in the great chimney-place I spied the figure of Colonel
Clark, more portly than of yore, and beside him stood a gentleman
who could be no other than General Wilkinson.
He was a man to fill the eye, handsome of face, symmetrical of
figure, easy of manner, and he wore a suit of bottle-green that
became him admirably. In short, so fascinated and absorbed was I
in watching him as he greeted this man and the other that I
started as though something had pricked me when I heard my name
called by Colonel Clark.
“Come here, Davy,” he cried across the room, and I came and
stood abashed before the hero. "General, allow me to present to
you the drummer boy of Kaskaskia and Vincennes, Mr. David
Ritchie.”
“I hear that you drummed them to victory through a very hell of
torture, Mr. Ritchie,” said the General. "It is an honor to grasp
the hand of one who did such service at such a tender age.”
General Wilkinson availed himself of that honor, and encompassed
me with a smile so benignant, so winning in its candor, that I
could only mutter my acknowledgment, and Colonel Clark must needs
apologize, laughing, for my youth and timidity.
“Mr. Ritchie is not good at speeches, General,” said he, “but I
make no doubt he will drink a bumper to your health before we sit
down. Gentlemen,” he cried, filling his glass from a bottle on the
table, “a toast to General Wilkinson, emancipator and saviour of
Kentucky!”
The company responded with a shout, tossed off the toast, and
sat down at the long table. Chance placed me between a young dandy
from Lexington — one of several the General had brought in his
train — and Mr. Wharton, a prominent planter of the neighborhood
with whom I had a speaking acquaintance. This was a backwoods
feast, though served in something better than the old backwoods
style, and we had venison and bear’s meat and prairie fowl as well
as pork and beef, and breads that came stinging hot from the Dutch
ovens. Toasts to this and that were flung back and forth, and
jests and gibes, and the butt of many of these was that poor
Federal government which (as one gentleman avowed) was like a
bantam hen trying to cover a nestful of turkey’s eggs, and
clucking with importance all the time. This picture brought on
gusts of laughter.
“And what say you of the Jay?” cried one; "what will he hatch?”
Hisses greeted the name, for Mr. Jay wished to enter into a
treaty with Spain, agreeing to close the river for five and twenty
years. Colonel Clark stood up, and rapped on the table.
“Gentlemen,” said he, “Louisville has as her guest of honor
to-night a man of whom Kentucky may well be proud (loud cheering).
Five years ago he favored Lexington by making it his home, and he
came to us with the laurel of former achievements still clinging
to his brow. He fought and suffered for his country, and attained
the honorable rank of Major in the Continental line. He was chosen
by the people of Pennsylvania to represent them in the august body
of their legislature, and now he has got new honor in a new field
(renewed cheering). He has come to Kentucky to show her the way to
prosperity and glory. Kentucky had a grievance (loud cries of
"Yes, yes!”). Her hogs and cattle had no market, her tobacco and
agricultural products of all kinds were rotting because the
Spaniards had closed the Mississippi to our traffic. Could the
Federal government open the river? (shouts of "No, no!” and
hisses). Who opened it? (cries of "Wilkinson, Wilkinson!”). He
said to the Kentucky planters, ’Give your tobacco to me, and I
will sell it.’ He put it in barges, he floated down the river,
and, as became a man of such distinction, he was met by
Governor-general Miro on the levee at New Orleans. Where is that
tobacco now, gentlemen?” Colonel Clark was here interrupted by
such roars and stamping that he paused a moment, and during this
interval Mr. Wharton leaned over and whispered quietly in my ear: —
“Ay, where is it?”
I stared at Mr. Wharton blankly. He was a man nearing the middle
age, with a lacing of red in his cheeks, a pleasant gray eye, and
a singularly quiet manner.
“Thanks to the genius of General Wilkinson,” Colonel Clark
continued, waving his hand towards the smilingly placid hero,
"that tobacco has been deposited in the King’s store at ten
dollars per hundred, — a privilege heretofore confined to Spanish
subjects. Well might Wilkinson return from New Orleans in a
chariot and four to a grateful Kentucky! This year we have
tripled, nay, quadrupled, our crop of tobacco, and we are here
to-night to give thanks to the author of this prosperity.” Alas,
Colonel Clark’s hand was not as steady as of yore, and he spilled
the liquor on the table as he raised his glass. "Gentlemen, a
health to our benefactor.”
They drank it willingly, and withal so lengthily and noisily
that Mr. Wilkinson stood smiling and bowing for full three minutes
before he could be heard. He was a very paragon of modesty, was
the General, and a man whose attitudes and expressions spoke as
eloquently as his words. None looked at him now but knew before he
opened his mouth that he was deprecating such an ovation.
“Gentlemen, — my friends and fellow-Kentuckians,” he said, “I
thank you from the bottom of my heart for your kindness, but I
assure you that I have done nothing worthy of it (loud protests).
I am a simple, practical man, who loves Kentucky better than he
loves himself. This is no virtue, for we all have it. We have the
misfortune to be governed by a set of worthy gentlemen who know
little about Kentucky and her wants, and think less (cries of "Ay,
ay!”). I am not decrying General Washington and his cabinet; it is
but natural that the wants of the seaboard and the welfare and
opulence of the Eastern cities should be uppermost in their minds
(another interruption). Kentucky, if she would prosper, must look
to her own welfare. And if any credit is due to me, gentlemen, it
is because I reserved my decision of his Excellency,
Governor-general Miro, and his people until I saw them for myself.
A little calm reason, a plain statement of the case, will often
remove what seems an insuperable difficulty, and I assure you that
Governor-general Miro is a most reasonable and courteous
gentleman, who looks with all kindliness and neighborliness on the
people of Kentucky. Let us drink a toast to him. To him your
gratitude is due, for he sends you word that your tobacco will be
received.”
“In General Wilkinson’s barges,” said Mr. Wharton leaning over
and subsiding again at once.
The General was the first to drink the toast, and he sat down
very modestly amidst a thunder of applause.
The young man on the other side of me, somewhat flushed, leaped
to his feet.
“Down with the Federal government!” he cried; "what have they
done for us, indeed? Before General Wilkinson went to New Orleans
the Spaniards seized our flat boats and cargoes and flung our
traders into prison, ay, and sent them to the mines of Brazil. The
Federal government takes sides with the Indians against us. And
what has that government done for you, Colonel?” he demanded,
turning to Clark, “you who have won for them half of their
territory? They have cast you off like an old moccasin. The
Continental officers who fought in the East have half-pay for life
or five years’ full pay. And what have you?”
There was a breathless hush. A swift vision came to me of a man,
young, alert, commanding, stern under necessity, self-repressed at
all times — a man who by the very dominance of his character had
awed into submission the fierce Northern tribes of a continent,
who had compelled men to follow him until the life had all but
ebbed from their bodies, who had led them to victory in the end.
And I remembered a boy who had stood awe-struck before this man in
the commandant’s house at Fort Sackville. Ay, and I heard again
his words as though he had just spoken them, “Promise me that you
will not forget me if I am — unfortunate.” I did not understand
then. And now because of a certain blinding of my eyes, I did not
see him clearly as he got slowly to his feet. He clutched the
table. He looked around him — I dare not say — vacantly. And then,
suddenly, he spoke with a supreme anger and a supreme bitterness.
“Not a shilling has this government given me,” he cried.
"Virginia was more grateful; from her I have some acres of wild
land and — a sword.” He laughed. "A sword, gentlemen, and not new at
that. Oh, a grateful government we serve, one careful of the honor
of her captains. Gentlemen, I stand to-day a discredited man
because the honest debts I incurred in the service of that
government are repudiated, because my friends who helped it,
Father Gibault, Vigo, and Gratiot, and others have never been
repaid. One of them is ruined.”
A dozen men had sprung clamoring to their feet before he sat
down. One, more excited than the rest, got the ear of the company.
“Do we lack leaders?” he cried. "We have them here with us
to-night, in this room. Who will stop us? Not the contemptible
enemies in Kentucky who call themselves Federalists. Shall we be
supine forever? We have fought once for our liberties, let us
fight again. Let us make a common cause with our real friends on
the far side of the Mississippi.”
I rose, sick at heart, but every man was standing. And then a
strange thing happened. I saw General Wilkinson at the far end of
the room; his hand was raised, and there was that on his handsome
face which might have been taken for a smile, and yet was not a
smile. Others saw him too, I know not by what exertion of
magnetism. They looked at him and they held their tongues.
“I fear that we are losing our heads, gentlemen,” he said; "and
I propose to you the health of the first citizen of Kentucky,
Colonel George Rogers Clark.”
I found myself out of the tavern and alone in the cool May
night. And as I walked slowly down the deserted street, my head in
a whirl, a hand was laid on my shoulder. I turned, startled, to
face Mr. Wharton, the planter.
“I would speak a word with you, Mr. Ritchie,” he said. "May I
come to your room for a moment?”
“Certainly, sir,” I answered.
After that we walked along together in silence, my own mind
heavily occupied with what I had seen and heard. We came to Mr.
Crede’s store, went in at the picket gate beside it and down the
path to my own door, which I unlocked. I felt for the candle on
the table, lighted it, and turned in surprise to discover that Mr.
Wharton was poking up the fire and pitching on a log of wood. He
flung off his greatcoat and sat down with his feet to the blaze. I
sat down beside him and waited, thinking him a sufficiently
peculiar man.
“You are not famous, Mr. Ritchie,” said he, presently.
“No, sir,” I answered.
“Nor particularly handsome,” he continued, “nor conspicuous in
any way.”
I agreed to this, perforce.
“You may thank God for it,” said Mr. Wharton.
“That would be a strange outpouring, sir,” said I.
He looked at me and smiled.
“What think you of this paragon, General Wilkinson?” he demanded
suddenly.
“I have Federal leanings, sir,” I answered
“Egad,” said he, “we’ll add caution to your lack of negative
accomplishments. I have had an eye on you this winter, though you
did not know it. I have made inquiries about you, and hence I am
not here to-night entirely through impulse. You have not made a
fortune at the law, but you have worked hard, steered wide of
sensation, kept your mouth shut. Is it not so?”
Astonished, I merely nodded in reply.
“I am not here to waste your time or steal your sleep,” he went
on, giving the log a push with his foot, “and I will come to the
point. When I first laid eyes on this fine gentleman, General
Wilkinson, I too fell a victim to his charms. It was on the eve of
this epoch-making trip of which we heard so glowing an account
to-night, and I made up my mind that no Spaniard, however wily,
could resist his persuasion. He said to me, ’Wharton, give me your
crop of tobacco and I promise you to sell it in spite of all the
royal mandates that go out of Madrid.’ He went, he saw, he
conquered the obdurate Miro as he has apparently conquered the
rest of the world, and he actually came back in a chariot and four
as befitted him. A heavy crop of tobacco was raised in Kentucky
that year. I helped to raise it,” added Mr. Wharton, dryly. "I
gave the General my second crop, and he sent it down. Mr. Ritchie,
I have to this day never received a piastre for my merchandise,
nor am I the only planter in this situation. Yet General Wilkinson
is prosperous.”
My astonishment somewhat prevented me from replying to this,
too. Was it possible that Mr. Wharton meant to sue the General? I
reflected while he paused. I remembered how inconspicuous he had
named me, and hope died. Mr. Wharton did not look at me, but
stared into the fire, for he was plainly not a man to rail and
rant.
“Mr. Ritchie, you are young, but mark my words, that man
Wilkinson will bring Kentucky to ruin if he is not found out. The
whole district from Crab Orchard to Bear Grass is mad about him.
Even Clark makes a fool of himself — "
“Colonel Clark, sir!” I cried.
He put up a hand.
“So you have some hot blood,” he said. "I know you love him. So
do I, or I should not have been there tonight. Do I blame his
bitterness? Do I blame — anything he does? The treatment he has had
would bring a blush of shame to the cheek of any nation save a
republic. Republics are wasteful, sir. In George Rogers Clark they
have thrown away a general who might some day have decided the
fate of this country, they have left to stagnate a man fit to lead
a nation to war. And now he is ready to intrigue against the
government with any adventurer who may have convincing ways and a
smooth tongue.”
“Mr. Wharton,” I said, rising, “did you come here to tell me
this?”
But Mr. Wharton continued to stare into the fire.
“I like you the better for it, my dear sir,” said he, “and I
assure you that I mean no offence. Colonel Clark is enshrined in
our hearts, Democrats and Federalists alike. Whatever he may do,
we shall love him always. But this other man, — pooh!” he exclaimed,
which was as near a vigorous expression as he got. "Now, sir, to
the point. I, too, am a Federalist, a friend of Mr. Humphrey
Marshall, and, as you know, we are sadly in the minority in
Kentucky now. I came here to-night to ask you to undertake a
mission in behalf of myself and certain other gentlemen, and I
assure you that my motives are not wholly mercenary.” He paused,
smiled, and put the tips of his fingers together. "I would
willingly lose every crop for the next ten years to convict this
Wilkinson of treason against the Federal government.”
“Treason!” I repeated involuntarily.
“Mr. Ritchie,” answered the planter, “I gave you credit for some
shrewdness. Do you suppose the Federal government does not realize
the danger of this situation in Kentucky. They have tried in vain
to open the Mississippi, and are too weak to do it. This man
Wilkinson goes down to see Miro, and Miro straightway opens the
river to us through him. How do you suppose Wilkinson did it? By
his charming personality?”
I said something, I know not what, as the light began to dawn on
me. And then I added, “I had not thought about the General.”
“Ah,” replied Mr. Wharton, “just so. And now you may easily
imagine that General Wilkinson has come to a very pretty
arrangement with Miro. For a certain stipulated sum best known to
Wilkinson and Miro, General Wilkinson agrees gradually to detach
Kentucky from the Union and join it to his Catholic Majesty’s
dominion of Louisiana. The bribe — the opening of the river. What
the government could not do Wilkinson did by the lifting of his
finger.”
Still Mr. Wharton spoke without heat.
“Mind you,” he said, “we have no proof of this, and that is my
reason for coming here to-night, Mr. Ritchie. I want you to get
proof of it if you can.”
“You want me — " I said, bewildered.
“I repeat that you are not handsome,” — I think he emphasized this
unduly, — "that you are self-effacing, inconspicuous; in short, you
are not a man to draw suspicion. You might travel anywhere and
scarcely be noticed, — I have observed that about you. In addition
to this you are wary, you are discreet, you are painstaking. I ask
you to go first to St. Louis, in Louisiana territory, and this for
two reasons. First, because it will draw any chance suspicion from
your real objective, New Orleans; and second, because it is
necessary to get letters to New Orleans from such leading citizens
of St. Louis as Colonel Chouteau and Monsieur Gratiot, and I will
give you introductions to them. You are then to take passage to
New Orleans in a barge of furs which Monsieur Gratiot is sending
down. Mind, we do not expect that you will obtain proof that Miro
is paying Wilkinson money. If you do, so much the better; but we
believe that both are too sharp to leave any tracks. You will make
a report, however, upon the conditions under which our tobacco is
being received, and of all other matters which you may think
germane to the business in hand. Will you go?”
I had made up my mind.
“Yes, I will go,” I answered.
“Good,” said Mr. Wharton, but with no more enthusiasm than he
had previously shown; "I thought I had not misjudged you. Is your
law business so onerous that you could not go to-morrow?”
I laughed.
“I think I could settle what affairs I have by noon, Mr.
Wharton,” I replied.
“Egad, Mr. Ritchie, I like your manner,” said he; "and now for a
few details, and you may go to bed.”
He sat with me half an hour longer, carefully reviewing his
instructions, and then he left me to a night of contemplation.
By eleven o’clock the next morning I had wound up my affairs,
having arranged with a young lawyer of my acquaintance to take
over such cases as I had, and I was busy in my room packing my
saddle-bags for the journey. The warm scents of spring were wafted
through the open door and window, smells of the damp earth giving
forth the green things, and tender shades greeted my eyes when I
paused and raised my head to think. Purple buds littered the black
ground before my door-step, and against the living green of the
grass I saw the red stain of a robin’s breast as he hopped
spasmodically hither and thither, now pausing immovable with his
head raised, now tossing triumphantly a wriggling worm from the
sod. Suddenly he flew away, and I heard a voice from the street
side that brought me stark upright.
“Hold there, neighbor; can you direct me to the mansion of that
celebrated barrister, Mr. Ritchie?”
There was no mistaking that voice — it was Nicholas Temple’s. I
heard a laugh and an answer, the gate slammed, and Mr. Temple
himself in a long gray riding-coat, booted and spurred, stood
before me.
“Davy,” he cried, “come out here and hug me. Why, you look as if
I were your grandmother’s ghost.”
“And if you were,” I answered, “you could not have surprised me
more. Where have you been?”
“At Jonesboro, acting the gallant with the widow, winning and
losing skins and cow-bells and land at rattle-and-snap,
horse-racing with that wild Mr. Jackson. Faith, he near shot the
top of my head off because I beat him at Greasy Cove.”
I laughed, despite my anxiety.
“And Sevier?” I demanded.
“You have not heard how Sevier got off?” exclaimed Nick. "Egad,
that was a crowning stroke of genius! Cozby and Evans, Captains
Greene and Gibson, and Sevier’s two boys whom you met on the
Nollichucky rode over the mountains to Morganton. Greene and
Gibson and Sevier’s boys hid themselves with the horses in a clump
outside the town, while Cozby and Evans, disguised as bumpkins in
hunting shirts, jogged into the town with Sevier’s racing mare
between them. They jogged into the town, I say, through the crowds
of white trash, and rode up to the court-house where Sevier was
being tried for his life. Evans stood at the open door and held
the mare and gaped, while Cozby stalked in and shouldered his way
to the front within four feet of the bar, like a big, awkward
countryman. Jack Sevier saw him, and he saw Evans with the mare
outside. Then, by thunder, Cozby takes a step right up to the bar
and cries out, ’Judge, aren’t you about done with that man?’
Faith, it was like judgment day, such a mix-up as there was after
that, and Nollichucky Jack made three leaps and got on the mare,
and in the confusion Cozby and Evans were off too, and the whole
State of North Carolina couldn’t catch ’em then.” Nick sighed.
"I’d have given my soul to have been there,” he said.
“Come in,” said I, for lack of something better.
“Cursed if you haven’t given me a sweet reception, Davy,” said
he. "Have you lost your practice, or is there a lady here, you
rogue,” and he poked into the cupboard with his stick. "Hullo,
where are you going now?” he added, his eye falling on the
saddle-bags.
I had it on my lips to say, and then I remembered Mr. Wharton’s
injunction.
“I’m going on a journey,” said I.
“When?” said Nick.
“I leave in about an hour,” said I.
He sat down. "Then I leave too,” he said.
“What do you mean, Nick?” I demanded.
“I mean that I will go with you,” said he.
“But I shall be gone three months or more,” I protested.
“I have nothing to do,” said Nick, placidly.
A vague trouble had been working in my mind, but now the full
horror of it dawned upon me. I was going to St. Louis. Mrs. Temple
and Harry Riddle were gone there, so Polly Ann had avowed, and
Nick could not help meeting Riddle. Sorely beset, I bent over to
roll up a shirt, and refrained from answering.
He came and laid a hand on my shoulder.
“What the devil ails you, Davy?” he cried. "If it is an
elopement, of course I won’t press you. I’m hanged if I’ll make a
third.”
“It is no elopement,” I retorted, my face growing hot in spite
of myself.
“Then I go with you,” said he, “for I vow you need taking care
of. You can’t put me off, I say. But never in my life have I had
such a reception, and from my own first cousin, too.”
I was in a quandary, so totally unforeseen was this situation.
And then a glimmer of hope came to me that perhaps his mother and
Riddle might not be in St. Louis after all. I recalled the
conversation in the cabin, and reflected that this wayward pair
had stranded on so many beaches, had drifted off again on so many
tides, that one place could scarce hold them long. Perchance they
had sunk, — who could tell? I turned to Nick, who stood watching me.
“It was not that I did not want you,” I said, “you must believe
that. I have wanted you ever since that night long ago when I
slipped out of your bed and ran away. I am going first to St.
Louis and then to New Orleans on a mission of much delicacy, a
mission that requires discretion and secrecy. You may come, with
all my heart, with one condition only — that you do not ask my
business.”
“Done!” cried Nick. "Davy, I was always sure of you; you are the
one fixed quantity in my life. To St. Louis, eh, and to New
Orleans? Egad, what havoc we’ll make among the Creole girls. May I
bring my nigger? He’ll do things for you too.”
“By all means,” said I, laughing, “only hurry.”
“I’ll run to the inn,” said Nick, “and be back in ten minutes.”
He got as far as the door, slapped his thigh, and looked back.
"Davy, we may run across — "
“Who?” I asked, with a catch of my breath.
“Harry Riddle,” he answered; "and if so, may God have mercy on
his soul!”
He ran down the path, the gate clicked, and I heard him
whistling in the street on his way to the inn.
After dinner we rode down to the ferry, Nick on the thoroughbred
which had beat Mr. Jackson’s horse, and his man, Benjy, on a
scraggly pony behind. Benjy was a small, black negro with a very
squat nose, alert and talkative save when Nick turned on him.
Benjy had been born at Temple Bow; he worshipped his master and
all that pertained to him, and he showered upon me all the respect
and attention that was due to a member of the Temple family. For
this I was very grateful. It would have been an easier journey had
we taken a boat down to Fort Massac, but such a proceeding might
have drawn too much attention to our expedition. I have no space
to describe that trip overland, which reminded me at every stage
of the march against Kaskaskia, the woods, the chocolate streams,
the coffee-colored swamps flecked with dead leaves, — and at length
the prairies, the grass not waist-high now, but young and tender,
giving forth the acrid smell of spring. Nick was delighted. He
made me recount every detail of my trials as a drummer boy, or
kept me in continuous spells of laughter over his own escapades.
In short, I began to realize that we were as near to each other as
though we had never been parted.
We looked down upon Kaskaskia from the self-same spot where I
had stood on the bluff with Colonel Clark, and the sounds were
even then the same, — the sweet tones of the church bell and the
lowing of the cattle. We found a few Virginians and Pennsylvanians
scattered in amongst the French, the forerunners of that change
which was to come over this country. And we spent the night with
my old friend, Father Gibault, still the faithful pastor of his
flock; cheerful, though the savings of his lifetime had never been
repaid by that country to which he had given his allegiance so
freely. Travelling by easy stages, on the afternoon of the second
day after leaving Kaskaskia we picked our way down the high bluff
that rises above the American bottom, and saw below us that yellow
monster among the rivers, the Mississippi. A blind monster he
seemed, searching with troubled arms among the islands for his
bed, swept onward by an inexorable force, and on his heaving
shoulders he carried great trees pilfered from the unknown forests
of the North.
Down in the moist and shady bottom we came upon the log hut of a
half-breed trapper, and he agreed to ferry us across. As for our
horses, a keel boat must be sent after these, and Monsieur Gratiot
would no doubt easily arrange for this. And so we found ourselves,
about five o’clock on that Saturday evening, embarked in a wide
pirogue on the current, dodging the driftwood, avoiding the
eddies, and drawing near to a village set on a low bluff on the
Spanish side and gleaming white among the trees. And as I looked,
the thought came again like a twinge of pain that Mrs. Temple and
Riddle might be there, thinking themselves secure in this spot, so
removed from the world and its doings.
“How now, my man of mysterious affairs?” cried Nick, from the
bottom of the boat; "you are as puckered as a sour persimmon. Have
you a treaty with Spain in your pocket or a declaration of war?
What can trouble you?”
“Nothing, if you do not,” I answered, smiling.
“Lord send we don’t admire the same lady, then,” said Nick.
"Pierrot,” he cried, turning to one of the boatmen,
“il y a des belles demoiselles la, n’est-ce pas?”
The man missed a stroke in his astonishment, and the boat swung
lengthwise in the swift current.
“Dame, Monsieur, il y en a,” he answered.
“Where did you learn French, Nick?” I demanded.
“Mr. Mason had it hammered into me,” he answered carelessly, his
eyes on the line of keel boats moored along the shore. Our guides
shot the canoe deftly between two of these, the prow grounded in
the yellow mud, and we landed on Spanish territory.
We looked about us while our packs were being unloaded, and the
place had a strange flavor in that year of our Lord, 1789. A
swarthy boatman in a tow shirt with a bright handkerchief on his
head stared at us over the gunwale of one of the keel boats, and
spat into the still, yellow water; three high-cheeked Indians,
with smudgy faces and dirty red blankets, regarded us in silent
contempt; and by the water-side above us was a sled loaded with a
huge water cask, a bony mustang pony between the shafts, and a
chanting negro dipping gourdfuls from the river. A road slanted up
the little limestone bluff, and above and below us stone houses
could be seen nestling into the hill, houses higher on the river
side, and with galleries there. We climbed the bluff, Benjy at our
heels with the saddle-bags, and found ourselves on a yellow-clay
street lined with grass and wild flowers. A great peace hung over
the village, an air of a different race, a restfulness strange to
a Kentuckian. Clematis and honeysuckle climbed the high palings,
and behind the privacy of these, low, big-chimneyed houses of
limestone, weathered gray, could be seen, their roofs sloping in
gentle curves to the shaded porches in front; or again, houses of
posts set upright in the ground and these filled between with
plaster, and so immaculately whitewashed that they gleamed against
the green of the trees which shaded them. Behind the houses was
often a kind of pink-and-cream paradise of flowering fruit trees,
so dear to the French settlers. There were vineyards, too, and
thrifty patches of vegetables, and lines of flowers set in the
carefully raked mould.
We walked on, enraptured by the sights around us, by the heavy
scent of the roses and the blossoms. Here was a quaint stone
horse-mill, a stable, or a barn set uncouthly on the street; a
baker’s shop, with a glimpse of the white-capped baker through the
shaded doorway, and an appetizing smell of hot bread in the air. A
little farther on we heard the tinkle of the blacksmith’s hammer,
and the man himself looked up from where the hoof rested on his
leather apron to give us a kindly “Bon soir, Messieurs,” as we
passed. And here was a cabaret, with the inevitable porch, from
whence came the sharp click of billiard balls.
We walked on, stopping now and again to peer between the
palings, when we heard, amidst the rattling of a cart and the
jingling of bells, a chorus of voices: —
“À cheval, à cheval, pour aller voir ma mie,
Lon, lon, la!”
A shaggy Indian pony came ambling around the corner between the
long shafts of a charette. A bareheaded young man in tow shirt and
trousers was driving, and three laughing girls were seated on the
stools in the cart behind him. Suddenly, before I quite realized
what had happened, the young man pulled up the pony, the girls
fell silent, and Nick was standing in the middle of the road, with
his hat in his hand, bowing elaborately.
“Je vous salue, Mesdemoiselles,” he cried, “mes anges a
char-a-banc. Pouvez-vous me diriger chez Monsieur Gratiot?”
“Sapristi!” exclaimed the young man, but he laughed. The young
women stood up, giggling, and peered at Nick over the young man’s
shoulder. One of them wore a fresh red-and-white calamanco gown.
She had a complexion of ivory tinged with red, raven hair, and
dusky, long-lashed, mischievous eyes brimming with merriment.
“Volontiers, Monsieur,” she answered, before the others could
catch their breath, “première droite et première gauche. Allons,
Gaspard!” she cried, tapping the young man sharply on the
shoulder, “es tu fou?”
Gaspard came to himself, flicked the pony, and they went off
down the road with shouts of laughter, while Nick stood waving his
hat until they turned the corner.
“Egad,” said he, “I’d take to the highway if I could be sure of
holding up such a cargo every time. Off with you, Benjy, and find
out where she lives,” he cried, and the obedient Benjy dropped the
saddle-bags as though such commands were not uncommon.
“Pick up those bags, Benjy,” said I, laughing.
Benjy glanced uncertainly at his master.
“Do as I tell you, you black scalawag,” said Nick, “or I’ll tan
you. What are you waiting for?”
“Marse Dave — " began Benjy, rolling his eyes in discomfiture.
“Look you, Nick Temple,” said I, “when you shipped with me you
promised that I should command. I can’t afford to have the town
about our ears.”
“Oh, very well, if you put it that way,” said Nick. "A little
honest diversion — Pick up the bags, Benjy, and follow the parson.”
Obeying Mademoiselle’s directions, we trudged on until we came
to a comfortable stone house surrounded by trees and set in a
half-block bordered by a seven-foot paling. Hardly had we opened
the gate when a tall gentleman of grave demeanor and sober dress
rose from his seat on the porch, and I recognized my friend of
Cahokia days, Monsieur Gratiot. He was a little more portly, his
hair was dressed now in an eelskin, and he looked every inch the
man of affairs that he was. He greeted us kindly and bade us come
up on the porch, where he read my letter of introduction.
“Why,” he exclaimed immediately, giving me a cordial grasp of
the hand, “of course. The strategist, the John Law, the reader of
character of Colonel Clark’s army. Yes, and worse, the prophet,
Mr. Ritchie.”
“And why worse, sir?” I asked.
“You predicted that Congress would never repay me for the little
loan I advanced to your Colonel.”
“It was not such a little loan, Monsieur,” I said.
“N’importe,” said he; "I went to Richmond with my box of scrip
and promissory notes, but I was not ill repaid. If I did not get
my money, I acquired, at least, a host of distinguished
acquaintances. But, Mr. Ritchie, you must introduce me to your
friend.”
“My cousin. Mr. Nicholas Temple,” I said.
Monsieur Gratiot looked at him fixedly.
“Of the Charlestown Temples?” he asked, and a sudden vague fear
seized me.
“Yes,” said Nick, “there was once a family of that name.”
“And now?” said Monsieur Gratiot, puzzled.
“Now,” said Nick, “now they are become a worthless lot of
refugees and outlaws, who by good fortune have escaped the
gallows.”
Before Monsieur Gratiot could answer, a child came running
around the corner of the house and stood, surprised, staring at
us. Nick made a face, stooped down, and twirled his finger.
Shouting with a terrified glee, the boy fled to the garden path,
Nick after him.
“I like Mr. Temple,” said Monsieur Gratiot, smiling. "He is
young, but he seems to have had a history.”
“The Revolution ruined many families — his was one,” I answered,
with what firmness of tone I could muster. And then Nick came
back, carrying the shouting youngster on his shoulders. At that
instant a lady appeared in the doorway, leading another child, and
we were introduced to Madame Gratiot.
“Gentlemen,” said Monsieur Gratiot, “you must make my house your
home. I fear your visit will not be as long as I could wish, Mr.
Ritchie,” he added, turning to me, “if Mr. Wharton correctly
states your business. I have an engagement to have my furs in New
Orleans by a certain time. I am late in loading, and as there is a
moon I am sending off my boats to-morrow night. The men will have
to work on Sunday.”
“We were fortunate to come in such good season,” I answered.
After a delicious supper of gumbo, a Creole dish, of fricassee,
of crême brûlé, of red wine and fresh wild strawberries, we sat on
the porch. The crickets chirped in the garden, the moon cast
fantastic shadows from the pecan tree on the grass, while Nick,
struggling with his French, talked to Madame Gratiot; and now and
then their gay laughter made Monsieur Gratiot pause and smile as
he talked to me of my errand. It seemed strange to me that a man
who had lost so much by his espousal of our cause should still be
faithful to the American republic. Although he lived in Louisiana,
he had never renounced the American allegiance which he had taken
at Cahokia. He regarded with no favor the pretensions of Spain
toward Kentucky. And (remarkably enough) he looked forward even
then to the day when Louisiana would belong to the republic. I
exclaimed at this.
“Mr. Ritchie,” said he, “the most casual student of your race
must come to the same conclusion. You have seen for yourself how
they have overrun and conquered Kentucky and the Cumberland
districts, despite a hideous warfare waged by all the tribes. Your
people will not be denied, and when they get to Louisiana, they
will take it, as they take everything else.”
He was a man strong in argument, was Monsieur Gratiot, for he
loved it. And he beat me fairly.
“Nay,” he said finally, “Spain might as well try to dam the
Mississippi as to dam your commerce on it. As for France, I love
her, though my people were exiled to Switzerland by the Edict of
Nantes. But France is rotten through the prodigality of her kings
and nobles, and she cannot hold Louisiana. The kingdom is sunk in
debt.” He cleared his throat. "As for this Wilkinson of whom you
speak, I know something of him. I have no doubt that Miro pensions
him, but I know Miro likewise, and you will obtain no proof of
that. You will, however, discover in New Orleans many things of
interest to your government and to the Federal party in Kentucky.
Colonel Chouteau and I will give you letters to certain French
gentlemen in New Orleans who can be trusted. There is Saint-Gré,
for instance, who puts a French Louisiana into his prayers. He has
never forgiven O’Reilly and his Spaniards for the murder of his
father in sixty-nine. Saint-Gré is a good fellow, — a cousin of the
present Marquis in France, — and his ancestors held many positions
of trust in the colony under the French régime. He entertains
lavishly at Les Îles, his plantation on the Mississippi. He has
the gossip of New Orleans at his tongue’s tip, and you will be
suspected of nothing save a desire to amuse yourselves if you go
there.” He paused interrupted by the laughter of the others. "When
strangers of note or of position drift here and pass on to New
Orleans, I always give them letters to Saint-Gré. He has a
charming daughter and a worthless son.”
Monsieur Gratiot produced his tabatiere and took a pinch of
snuff. I summoned my courage for the topic which had trembled all
the evening on my lips.
“Some years ago, Monsieur Gratiot, a lady and a gentleman were
rescued on the Wilderness Trail in Kentucky. They left us for St.
Louis. Did they come here?”
Monsieur Gratiot leaned forward quickly.
“They were people of quality?” he demanded.
“Yes.”
“And their name?”
“They — they did not say.”
“It must have been the Clives,” he cried "it can have been no
other. Tell me — a woman still beautiful, commanding, of perhaps
eight and thirty? A woman who had a sorrow? — a great sorrow, though
we have never learned it. And Mr. Clive, a man of fashion, ill
content too, and pining for the life of a capital?”
“Yes,” I said eagerly, my voice sinking near to a whisper,
"yes — it is they. And are they here?”
Monsieur Gratiot took another pinch of snuff. It seemed an age
before he answered: —
“It is curious that you should mention them, for I gave them
letters to New Orleans, — amongst others, to Saint-Gré. Mrs. Clive
was — what shall I say? — haunted. Monsieur Clive talked of nothing
but Paris, where they had lived once. And at last she gave in.
They have gone there.”
“To Paris?” I said, taking breath.
“Yes. It is more than a year ago,” he continued, seeming not to
notice my emotion; “they went by way of New Orleans, in one of
Chouteau’s boats. Mrs. Clive seemed a woman with a great sorrow.”
SUNDAY came with the soft haziness of a June morning, and the
dew sucked a fresh fragrance from the blossoms and the grass. I
looked out of our window at the orchard, all pink and white in the
early sun, and across a patch of clover to the stone kitchen. A
pearly, feathery smoke was wafted from the chimney, a delicious
aroma of Creole coffee pervaded the odor of the blossoms, and a
cotton-clad negro
à pieds nus
came down the path with two steaming
cups and knocked at our door. He who has tasted Creole coffee will
never forget it. The effect of it was lost upon Nick, for he laid
down the cup, sighed, and promptly went to sleep again, while I
dressed and went forth to make his excuses to the family. I found
Monsieur and Madame with their children walking among the flowers.
Madame laughed.
“He is charming, your cousin,” said she. “Let
him sleep, by all
means, until after Mass. Then you must come with us to Madame
Chouteau’s, my mother’s. Her children and grandchildren dine with
her every Sunday.”
“Madame Chouteau, my mother-in-law, is the queen regent of St.
Louis, Mr. Ritchie,” said Monsieur Gratiot, gayly. “We
are all
afraid of her, and I warn you that she is a very determined and
formidable personage. She is the widow of the founder of St.
Louis, the Sieur Laclede, although she prefers her own name. She
rules us with a strong hand, dispenses justice, settles disputes,
and — sometimes indulges in them herself. It is her right.”
“You will see a very pretty French custom of submission to
parents,” said Madame Gratiot. "And afterwards there is a ball.”
“A ball!” I exclaimed involuntarily.
“It may seem very strange to you, Mr. Ritchie, but we believe
that Sunday was made to enjoy. They will have time to attend the
ball before you send them down the river?” she added
mischievously, turning to her husband.
“Certainly,” said he, “the loading will not be finished before
eight o’clock.”
Presently Madame Gratiot went off to Mass, while I walked with
Monsieur Gratiot to a storehouse near the river’s bank, whence the
skins, neatly packed and numbered, were being carried to the boats
on the sweating shoulders of the negroes, the half-breeds, and the
Canadian boatmen, — bulky bales of yellow elk, from the upper plains
of the Missouri, of buffalo and deer and bear, and priceless
little packages of the otter and the beaver trapped in the green
shade of the endless Northern forests, and brought hither in
pirogues down the swift river by the red tribesmen and Canadian
adventurers.
Afterwards I strolled about the silent village. Even the
cabarets were deserted. A private of the Spanish Louisiana
Regiment in a dirty uniform slouched behind the palings in front
of the commandant’s quarters, — a quaint stone house set against the
hill, with dormer windows in its curving roof, with a wide porch
held by eight sturdy hewn pillars; here and there the muffled
figure of a prowling Indian loitered, or a barefooted negress
shuffled along by the fence crooning a folk-song. All the world
had obeyed the call of the church bell save these — and Nick. I
bethought myself of Nick, and made my way back to Monsieur
Gratiot’s.
I found my cousin railing at Benjy, who had extracted from the
saddle-bags a wondrous gray suit of London cut in which to array
his master. Clothes became Nick’s slim figure remarkably. This
coat was cut away smartly, like a uniform, towards the tails, and
was brought in at the waist with an infinite art.
“Whither now, my conquistador?” I said.
“To Mass,” said he.
“To Mass!” I exclaimed; "but you have slept through the greater
part of it.”
“The best part is to come,” said Nick, giving a final touch to
his neck-band. Followed by Benjy’s adoring eyes, he started out of
the door, and I followed him perforce. We came to the little
church, of upright logs and plaster, with its crudely shingled,
peaked roof, with its tiny belfry crowned by a cross, with its
porches on each side shading the line of windows there. Beside the
church, a little at the back, was the cure’s modest house of
stone, and at the other hand, under spreading trees, the graveyard
with its rough wooden crosses. And behind these graves rose the
wooded hill that stretched away towards the wilderness.
What a span of life had been theirs who rested here! Their
youth, perchance, had been spent amongst the crooked streets of
some French village, streets lined by red-tiled houses and
crossing limpid streams by quaint bridges. Death had overtaken
them beside a monster tawny river of which their imaginations had
not conceived, a river which draws tribute from the remote places
of an unknown land, — a river, indeed, which, mixing all the waters,
seemed to symbolize a coming race which was to conquer the land by
its resistless flow, even as the Mississippi bore relentlessly
towards the sea.
These were my own thoughts as I listened to the tones of the
priest as they came, droningly, out of the door, while Nick was
exchanging jokes in doubtful French with some half-breeds leaning
against the palings. Then we heard benches scraping on the floor,
and the congregation began to file out.
Those who reached the steps gave back, respectfully, and there
came an elderly lady in a sober turban, a black mantilla wrapped
tightly about her shoulders, and I made no doubt that she was
Monsieur Gratiot’s mother-in-law, Madame Chouteau, she whom he had
jestingly called the queen regent. I was sure of this when I saw
Madame Gratiot behind her. Madame Chouteau indeed had the face of
authority, a high-bridged nose, a determined chin, a mouth that
shut tightly. Madame Gratiot presented us to her mother, and as
she passed on to the gate Madame Chouteau reminded us that we were
to dine with her at two.
After her the congregation, the well-to-do and the poor alike,
poured out of the church and spread in merry groups over the
grass: keel boatmen in tow shirts and party-colored worsted belts,
the blacksmith, the shoemaker, the farmer of a small plot in the
common fields in large cotton pantaloons and light-wove camlet
coat, the more favored in skull-caps, linen small-clothes, cotton
stockings, and silver-buckled shoes, — every man pausing, dipping
into his tabatiere, for a word with his neighbor. The women, too,
made a picture strange to our eyes, the matrons in jacket and
petticoat, a Madras handkerchief flung about their shoulders, the
girls in fresh cottonade or calamanco.
All at once cries of "’Polyte! ’Polyte!” were heard, and a
nimble young man with a jester-like face hopped around the corner
of the church, trundling a barrel. Behind ’Polyte came two rotund
little men perspiring freely, and laden down with various
articles, — a bird-cage with two yellow birds, a hat-trunk, an
inlaid card box, a roll of scarlet cloth, and I know not what
else. They deposited these on the grass beside the barrel, which
’Polyte had set on end and proceeded to mount, encouraged by the
shouts of his friends, who pressed around the barrel.
“It’s an auction,” I said.
But Nick did not hear me. I followed his glance to the far side
of the circle, and my eye was caught by a red ribbon, a blush that
matched it. A glance shot from underneath long lashes, — but not for
me. Beside the girl, and palpably uneasy, stood the young man who
had been called Gaspard.
“Ah,” said I, “your angel of the tumbrel.”
But Nick had pulled off his hat and was sweeping her a bow. The
girl looked down, smoothing her ribbon, Gaspard took a step
forward, and other young women near us tittered with delight. The
voice of Hippolyte rolling his r’s called out in a French
dialect: —
“M’ssieurs et Mesdames, ce sont des effets d’un pauvre officier
qui est mort. Who will buy?” He opened the hat-trunk, produced an
antiquated beaver with a gold cord, and surveyed it with a
covetousness that was admirably feigned. For ’Polyte was an actor.
"M’ssieurs, to own such a hat were a patent of nobility. Am I bid
twenty livres?”
There was a loud laughter, and he was bid four.
“Gaspard,” cried the auctioneer, addressing the young man of the
tumbrel, “Suzanne would no longer hesitate if she saw you in such
a hat. And with the trunk, too. Ah, mon Dieu, can you afford to
miss it?”
The crowd howled, Suzanne simpered, and Gaspard turned as pink
as clover. But he was not to be bullied. The hat was sold to an
elderly person, the red cloth likewise; a pot of grease went to a
housewife, and there was a veritable scramble for the box of
playing cards; and at last Hippolyte held up the wooden cage with
the fluttering yellow birds.
“Ha!” he cried, his eyes on Gaspard once more, “a gentle
present — a present to make a heart relent. And Monsieur Léon,
perchance you will make a bid, although they are not gamecocks.”
Instantly, from somewhere under the barrel, a cock crew. Even
the yellow birds looked surprised, and as for ’Polyte, he nearly
dropped the cage. One elderly person crossed himself. I looked at
Nick. His face was impassive, but suddenly I remembered his
boyhood gift, how he had imitated the monkeys, and I began to
shake with inward laughter. There was an uncomfortable silence.
“Peste, c’est la magie!” said an old man at last, searching with
an uncertain hand for his snuff.
“Monsieur,” cried Nick to the auctioneer, “I will make a bid.
But first you must tell me whether they are cocks or yellow
birds.”
“Parbleu,” answered the puzzled Hippolyte, “that I do not know,
Monsieur.”
Everybody looked at Nick, including Suzanne.
“Very well,” said he, “I will make a bid. And if they turn out
to be gamecocks, I will fight them with Monsieur Léon behind the
cabaret. Two livres!”
There was a laugh, as of relief.
“Three!” cried Gaspard, and his voice broke.
Hippolyte looked insulted.
“M’ssieurs,” he shouted, “they are from the Canaries. Diable, un
berger doit etre genereux.”
Another laugh, and Gaspard wiped the perspiration from his face.
“Five!” said he.
“Six!” said Nick, and the villagers turned to him in wonderment.
What could such a fine Monsieur want with two yellow birds?
“En avant, Gaspard,” said Hippolyte, and Suzanne shot another
barbed glance in our direction.
“Seven,” muttered Gaspard.
“Eight!” said Nick, immediately.
“Nine,” said Gaspard.
“Ten,” said Nick.
“Ten,” cried Hippolyte, “I am offered ten livres for the yellow
birds. Une bagatelle! Onze, Gaspard! Onze! onze livres, pour
l’amour de Suzanne!”
But Gaspard was silent. No appeals, entreaties, or taunts could
persuade him to bid more. And at length Hippolyte, with a gesture
of disdain, handed Nick the cage, as though he were giving it
away.
“Monsieur,” he said, “the birds are yours, since there are no
more lovers who are worthy of the name. They do not exist.”
“Monsieur,” answered Nick, “it is to disprove that statement
that I have bought the birds. Mademoiselle,” he added, turning to
the flushing Suzanne, “I pray that you will accept this present
with every assurance of my humble regard.”
Mademoiselle took the cage, and amidst the laughter of the
village at the discomfiture of poor Gaspard, swept Nick a
frightened courtesy, — one that nevertheless was full of coquetry.
And at that instant, to cap the situation, a rotund little man
with a round face under a linen biretta grasped Nick by the hand,
and cried in painful but sincere English: —
“Monsieur, you mek my daughter ver’ happy. She want those bird
ever sence Captain Lopez he die. Monsieur, I am Jean Baptiste
Lenoir, Colonel Chouteau’s miller, and we ver’ happy to see you at
the pon’.”
“If Monsieur will lead the way,” said Nick, instantly, taking
the little man by the arm.
“But you are to dine at Madame Chouteau’s,” I expostulated.
“To be sure,” said he. “Au revoir, Monsieur. Au revoir,
Mademoiselle. Plus tard, Mademoiselle; nous danserons plus tard.”
“What devil inhabits you?” I said, when I had got him started on
the way to Madame Chouteau’s.
“Your own, at present, Davy,” he answered, laying a hand on my
shoulder, “else I should be on the way to the pon’ with Lenoir.
But the ball is to come,” and he executed several steps in
anticipation. "Davy, I am sorry for you.”
“Why?” I demanded, though feeling a little self-commiseration
also.
“You will never know how to enjoy yourself,” said he, with
conviction.
Madame Chouteau lived in a stone house, wide and low, surrounded
by trees and gardens. It was a pretty tribute of respect her
children and grandchildren paid her that day, in accordance with
the old French usage of honoring the parent. I should like to
linger on the scene, and tell how Nick made them all laugh over
the story of Suzanne Lenoir and the yellow birds, and how the
children pressed around him and made him imitate all the denizens
of wood and field, amid deafening shrieks of delight.
“You have probably delayed Gaspard’s wooing another year, Mr.
Temple. Suzanne is a sad coquette,” said Colonel Auguste Chouteau,
laughing, as we set out for the ball.
The sun was hanging low over the western hills as we approached
the barracks, and out of the open windows came the merry, mad
sounds of violin, guitar, and flageolet, the tinkle of a triangle
now and then, the shouts of laughter, the shuffle of many feet
over the puncheons. Within the door, smiling and benignant,
unmindful of the stifling atmosphere, sat the black-robed village
priest talking volubly to an elderly man in a scarlet cap, and
several stout ladies ranged along the wall: beyond them, on a
platform, Zéron, the baker, fiddled as though his life depended on
it, the perspiration dripping from his brow, frowning,
gesticulating at them with the flageolet and the triangle. And in
a dim, noisy, heated whirl the whole village went round and round
and round under the low ceiling in the valse, young and old, rich
and poor, high and low, the sound of their laughter and the
scraping of their feet cut now and again by an agonized squeak
from Zéron’s fiddle. From time to time a staggering, panting
couple would fling themselves out, help themselves liberally to
pink sirop from the bowl on the side table, and then fling
themselves in once more, until Zéron stopped from sheer
exhaustion, to tune up for a pas de deux.
Across the room, by the sirop bowl, a pair of red ribbons
flaunted, a pair of eyes sent a swift challenge, Zéron and his
assistants struck up again, and there in a corner was Nick Temple,
with characteristic effrontery attempting a pas de deux with
Suzanne. Though Nick was ignorant, he was not ungraceful, and the
village laughed and admired. And when Zéron drifted back into a
valse he seized Suzanne’s plump figure in his arms and bore her,
unresisting, like a prize among the dancers, avoiding alike the
fat and unwieldy, the clumsy and the spiteful. For a while the
tune held its mad pace, and ended with a shriek and a snap on a
high note, for Zéron had broken a string. Amid a burst of laughter
from the far end of the room I saw Nick stop before an open window
in which a prying Indian was framed, swing Suzanne at arm’s
length, and bow abruptly at the brave with a grunt that startled
him into life.
“Va-t’en, méchant!” shrieked Suzanne, excitedly.
Poor Gaspard! Poor Hippolyte! They would gain Suzanne for a
dance only to have her snatched away at the next by the slim and
reckless young gentleman in the gray court clothes. Little Nick
cared that the affair soon became the amusement of the company.
From time to time, as he glided past with Suzanne on his shoulder,
he nodded gayly to Colonel Chouteau or made a long face at me, and
to save our souls we could not help laughing.
“The girl has met her match, for she has played shuttle-cock
with all the hearts in the village,” said Monsieur Chouteau. "But
perhaps it is just as well that Mr. Temple is leaving to-night. I
have signed a bon, Mr. Ritchie, by which you can obtain money at
New Orleans. And do not forget to present our letter to Monsieur
de Saint Gre. He has a daughter, by the way, who will be more of a
match for your friend’s fascinations than Suzanne.”
The evening faded into twilight, with no signs of weariness from
the dancers. And presently there stood beside us Jean Baptiste
Lenoir, the Colonel’s miller.
“B’soir, Monsieur le Colonel,” he said, touching his skull-cap,
"the water is very low. You fren’,” he added, turning to me, “he
stay long time in St. Louis?”
“He is going away to-night, — in an hour or so,” I answered, with
thanksgiving in my heart.
“I am sorry,” said Monsieur Lenoir, politely, but his looks
belied his words. "He is ver’ fond Suzanne. Peut-être he marry
her, but I think not. I come away from France to escape the fine
gentlemen; long time ago they want to run off with my wife. She
was like Suzanne.”
“How long ago did you come from France, Monsieur?” I asked, to
get away from an uncomfortable subject.
“It is twenty years,” said he, dreamily, in French. "I was born
in the Quartier Saint Jean, on the harbor of the city of
Marseilles near Notre Dame de la Nativité.” And he told of a tall,
uneven house of four stories, with a high pitched roof, and a
little barred door and window at the bottom giving out upon the
rough cobbles. He spoke of the smell of the sea, of the rollicking
sailors who surged through the narrow street to embark on his
Majesty’s men-of-war, and of the King’s white soldiers in ranks of
four going to foreign lands. And how he had become a farmer, the
tenant of a country family. Excitement grew on him, and he mopped
his brow with his blue rumal handkerchief.
“They desire all, the nobles,” he cried, “I make the land good,
and they seize it. I marry a pretty wife, and Monsieur le Comte he
want her. L’bon Dieu,” he added bitterly, relapsing into French.
"France is for the King and the nobility, Monsieur. The poor have
but little chance there. In the country I have seen the peasants
eat roots, and in the city the poor devour the refuse from the
houses of the rich. It was we who paid for their luxuries, and
with mine own eyes I have seen their gilded coaches ride down weak
men and women in the streets. But it cannot last. They will murder
Louis and burn the great châteaux. I, who speak to you, am of the
people, Monsieur, I know it.”
The sun had long set, and with flint and tow they were touching
the flame to the candles, which flickered transparent yellow in
the deepening twilight. So absorbed had I become in listening to
Lenoir’s description that I had forgotten Nick. Now I searched for
him among the promenading figures, and missed him. In vain did I
seek for a glimpse of Suzanne’s red ribbons, and I grew less and
less attentive to the miller’s reminiscences and arraignments of
the nobility. Had Nick indeed run away with his daughter?
The dancing went on with unabated zeal, and through the open
door in the fainting azure of the sky the summer moon hung above
the hills like a great yellow orange. Striving to hide my
uneasiness, I made my farewells to Madame Chouteau’s sons and
daughters and their friends, and with Colonel Chouteau I left the
hall and began to walk towards Monsieur Gratiot’s, hoping against
hope that Nick had gone there to change. But we had scarce reached
the road before we could see two figures in the distance, hazily
outlined in the mid-light of the departed sun and the coming moon.
The first was Monsieur Gratiot himself, the second Benjy. Monsieur
Gratiot took me by the hand.
“I regret to inform you, Mr. Ritchie,” said he, politely, “that
my keel boats are loaded and ready to leave. Were you on any other
errand I should implore you to stay with us.”
“Is Temple at your house?” I asked faintly.
“Why, no,” said Monsieur Gratiot; "I thought he was with you at
the ball.”
“Where is your master?” I demanded sternly of Benjy.
“I ain’t seed him, Marse Dave, sence I put him inter dem fine
clothes ’at he w’ars a-cou’tin’.”
“He has gone off with the girl,” put in Colonel Chouteau,
laughing.
“But where?” I said, with growing anger at this lack of
consideration on Nick’s part.
“I’ll warrant that Gaspard or Hippolyte Beaujais will know, if
they can be found,” said the Colonel. "Neither of them willingly
lets the girl out of his sight.”
As we hurried back towards the throbbing sounds of Zéron’s
fiddle I apologized as best I might to Monsieur Gratiot, declaring
that if Nick were not found within the half-hour I would leave
without him. My host protested that an hour or so would make no
difference. We were about to pass through the group of loungers
that loitered by the gate when the sound of rapid footsteps
arrested us, and we turned to confront two panting and perspiring
young men who halted beside us. One was Hippolyte Beaujais, more
fantastic than ever as he faced the moon, and the other was
Gaspard. They had plainly made a common cause, but it was
Hippolyte who spoke.
“Monsieur,” he cried, “you seek your friend? Ha, we have found
him, — we will lead you to him.”
“Where is he?” said Colonel Chouteau, repressing another laugh.
“On the pond, Monsieur, — in a boat, Monsieur, with Suzanne,
Monsieur le Colonel! And, moreover, he will come ashore for no
one.”
“Parbleu,” said the Colonel, “I should think not for any
arguments that you two could muster. But we will go there.”
“How far is it?” I asked, thinking of Monsieur Gratiot.
“About a mile,” said Colonel Chouteau, “a pleasant walk.”
We stepped out, Hippolyte and Gaspard running in front, the
Colonel and Monsieur Gratiot and myself following; and a snicker
which burst out now and then told us that Benjy was in the rear.
On any other errand I should have thought the way beautiful, for
the country road, rutted by wooden wheels, wound in and out
through pleasant vales and over gentle rises, whence we caught
glimpses from time to time of the Mississippi gleaming like molten
gold to the eastward. Here and there, nestling against the gentle
slopes of the hillside clearing, was a low-thatched farmhouse
among its orchards. As we walked, Nick’s escapade, instead of
angering Monsieur Gratiot, seemed to present itself to him in a
more and more ridiculous aspect, and twice he nudged me to call my
attention to the two vengefully triumphant figures silhouetted
against the moon ahead of us. From time to time also I saw Colonel
Chouteau shaking with laughter. As for me, it was impossible to be
angry at Nick for any space. Nobody else would have carried off a
girl in the face of her rivals for a moonlight row on a pond a
mile away.
At length we began to go down into the valley where Chouteau’s
pond was, and we caught glimpses of the shimmering of its waters
through the trees, ay, and presently heard them tumbling lightly
over the mill-dam. The spot was made for romance, — a sequestered
vale, clad with forest trees, cleared a little by the water-side,
where Monsieur Lenoir raised his maize and his vegetables. Below
the mill, so Monsieur Gratiot told me, where the creek lay in
pools on its limestone bed, the village washing was done; and
every Monday morning bare-legged negresses strode up this road,
the bundles of clothes balanced on their heads, the paddles in
their hands, followed by a stream of black urchins who tempted
Providence to drown them.
Down in the valley we came to a path that branched from the road
and led under the oaks and hickories towards the pond, and we had
not taken twenty paces in it before the notes of a guitar and the
sound of a voice reached our ears. And then, when the six of us
stood huddled in the rank growth at the water’s edge, we saw a
boat floating idly in the forest shadow on the far side.
I put my hand to my mouth.
“Nick!” I shouted.
There came for an answer, with the careless and unskilful
thrumming of the guitar, the end of the verse: —
“Thine eyes are bright as the stars at night,
Thy cheeks like the rose of the dawning, oh!”
“Hélas!” exclaimed Hippolyte, sadly, “there is no other boat.”
“Nick!” I shouted again, reenforced vociferously by the others.
The music ceased, there came feminine laughter across the water,
then Nick’s voice, in French that dared everything: —
“Go away and amuse yourselves at the dance. Peste, it is scarce
an hour ago I threatened to row ashore and break your heads. Allez
vous en, jaloux!”
A scream of delight from Suzanne followed this sally, which was
received by Gaspard and Hippolyte with a rattle of sacrés,
and — despite our irritation — the Colonel, Monsieur Gratiot, and
myself with a burst of involuntary laughter.
“Parbleu,” said the Colonel, choking, “it is a pity to disturb
such a one. Gratiot, if it was my boat, I’d delay the departure
till morning.”
“Indeed, I shall have had no small entertainment as a solace,”
said Monsieur Gratiot. "Listen!”
The tinkle of the guitar was heard again, and Nick’s voice,
strong and full and undisturbed: —
“S’posin’ I was to go to N’ O’leans an’ take sick an’ die,
Like a bird into the country my spirit would fly.
Go ’way, old man, and leave me alone,
For I am a stranger and a long way from home.”
There was a murmur of voices in the boat, the sound of a paddle
gurgling as it dipped, and the dugout shot out towards the middle
of the pond and drifted again.
I shouted once more at the top of my lungs: —
“Come in here, Nick, instantly!”
There was a moment’s silence.
“By gad, it’s Parson Davy!” I heard Nick exclaim. "Halloo, Davy,
how the deuce did you get there?”
“No thanks to you,” I retorted hotly. "Come in.”
“Lord,” said he, “is it time to go to New Orleans?”
“One might think New Orleans was across the street,” said
Monsieur Gratiot. "What an attitude of mind!”
The dugout was coming towards us now, propelled by easy strokes,
and Nick could be heard the while talking in low tones to Suzanne.
We could only guess at the tenor of his conversation, which ceased
entirely as they drew near. At length the prow slid in among the
rushes, was seized vigorously by Gaspard and Hippolyte, and the
boat hauled ashore.
“Thank you very much, Messieurs; you are most obliging,” said
Nick. And taking Suzanne by the hand, he helped her gallantly over
the gunwale. "Monsieur,” he added, turning in his most
irresistible manner to Monsieur Gratiot, “if I have delayed the
departure of your boat, I am exceedingly sorry. But I appeal to
you if I have not the best of excuses.”
And he bowed to Suzanne, who stood beside him coyly, looking
down. As for ’Polyte and Gaspard, they were quite breathless
between rage and astonishment. But Colonel Chouteau began to
laugh.
“Diable, Monsieur, you are right,” he cried, “and rather than
have missed this entertainment I would pay Gratiot for his cargo.”
“Au revoir, Mademoiselle,” said Nick, “I will return when I am
released from bondage. When this terrible mentor relaxes
vigilance, I will escape and make my way back to you through the
forests.”
“Oh!” cried Mademoiselle to me, “you will let him come back,
Monsieur.”
“Assuredly, Mademoiselle,” I said, “but I have known him longer
than you, and I tell you that in a month he will not wish to come
back.”
Hippolyte gave a grunt of approval to this plain speech. Suzanne
exclaimed, but before Nick could answer footsteps were heard in
the path and Lenoir himself, perspiring, panting, exhausted,
appeared in the midst of us.
“Suzanne!” he cried, “Suzanne!” And turning to Nick, he added
quite simply, “So, Monsieur, you did not run off with her, after
all?”
“There was no place to run, Monsieur,” answered Nick.
“Praise be to God for that!” said the miller, heartily, “there
is some advantage in living in the wilderness, when everything is
said.”
“I shall come back and try, Monsieur,” said Nick.
The miller raised his hands.
“I assure you that he will not, Monsieur,” I put in.
He thanked me profusely, and suddenly an idea seemed to strike
him.
“There is the priest,” he cried; "Monsieur le curé retires late.
There is the priest, Monsieur.”
There was an awkward silence, broken at length by an exclamation
from Gaspard. Colonel Chouteau turned his back, and I saw his
shoulders heave. All eyes were on Nick, but the rascal did not
seem at all perturbed.
“Monsieur,” he said, bowing, “marriage is a serious thing, and
not to be entered into lightly. I thank you from my heart, but I
am bound now with Mr. Ritchie on an errand of such importance that
I must make a sacrifice of my own interests and affairs to his.”
“If Mr. Temple wishes — " I began, with malicious delight. But
Nick took me by the shoulder.
“My dear Davy,” he said, giving me a vicious kick, “I could not
think of it. I will go with you at once. Adieu, Mademoiselle,”
said he, bending over Suzanne’s unresisting hand. “Adieu,
Messieurs, and I thank you for your great interest in me.” (This
to Gaspard and Hippolyte.)
“And now, Monsieur Gratiot, I have already presumed too much on
your patience. I will follow you, Monsieur.”
We left them, Lenoir, Suzanne, and her two suitors, standing at
the pond, and made our way through the path in the forest. It was
not until we reached the road and had begun to climb out of the
valley that the silence was broken between us.
“Monsieur,” said Colonel Chouteau, slyly, “do you have many such
escapes?”
“It might have been closer,” said Nick.
“Closer?” ejaculated the Colonel.
“Assuredly,” said Nick, “to the extent of abducting Monsieur le
curé. As for you, Davy,” he added, between his teeth, “I mean to
get even with you.”
It was well for us that the Colonel and Monsieur Gratiot took
the escapade with such good nature. And so we walked along through
the summer night, talking gayly, until at length the lights of the
village twinkled ahead of us, and in the streets we met many
parties making merry on their homeward way. We came to Monsieur
Gratiot’s, bade our farewells to Madame, picked up our
saddle-bags, the two gentlemen escorting us down to the river bank
where the keel boat was tugging at the ropes that held her,
impatient to be off. Her captain, a picturesque Canadian by the
name of Xavier Paret, was presented to us; we bade our friends
farewell, and stepped across the plank to the deck. As we were
casting off, Monsieur Gratiot called to us that he would take the
first occasion to send our horses back to Kentucky. The oars were
manned, the heavy hulk moved, and we were shot out into the mighty
current of the river on our way to New Orleans.
Nick and I stood for a long time on the deck, and the windows of
the little village gleamed like stars among the trees. We passed
the last of its houses that nestled against the hill, and below
that the forest lay like velvet under the moon. The song of our
boatmen broke the silence of the night: —
“Voici le temps et la saison,
Voici le temps et la saison,
Ah! vrai, que les journees sont longues,
Ah! vrai, que les journees sont longues!”
WE WERE embarked on a strange river, in a strange boat, and
bound for a strange city. To us Westerners a halo of romance, of
unreality, hung over New Orleans. To us it had an Old World,
almost Oriental flavor of mystery and luxury and pleasure, and we
imagined it swathed in the moisture of the Delta, built of quaint
houses, with courts of shining orange trees and magnolias, and
surrounded by flowering plantations of unimagined beauty. It was
most fitting that such a place should be the seat of dark
intrigues against material progress, and this notion lent added
zest to my errand thither. As for Nick, it took no great sagacity
on my part to predict that he would forget Suzanne and begin to
look forward to the Creole beauties of the Mysterious City.
First, there was the fur-laden keel boat in which we travelled,
gone forever now from Western navigation. It had its rude square
sail to take advantage of the river winds, its mast strongly
braced to hold the long tow-ropes. But tow-ropes were for the
endless up-river journey, when a numerous crew strained day after
day along the bank, chanting the voyageurs’ songs. Now we were
light-manned, two half-breeds and two Canadians to handle the oars
in time of peril, and Captain Xavier, who stood aft on the cabin
roof, leaning against the heavy beam of the long, curved tiller,
watching hawklike for snag and eddy and bar. Within the cabin was
a great fireplace of stones, where our cooking was done, and bunks
set round for the men in cold weather and rainy. But in these fair
nights we chose to sleep on deck.
Far into the night we sat, Nick and I, our feet dangling over
the forward edge of the cabin, looking at the glory of the moon on
the vast river, at the endless forest crown, at the haze which
hung like silver dust under the high bluffs on the American side.
We slept. We awoke again as the moon was shrinking abashed before
the light that glowed above these cliffs, and the river was turned
from brown to gold and then to burnished copper, the forest to a
thousand shades of green from crest to the banks where the river
was licking the twisted roots to nakedness. The south wind wafted
the sharp wood-smoke from the chimney across our faces. In the
stern Xavier stood immovable against the tiller, his short pipe
clutched between his teeth, the colors of his new worsted belt
made gorgeous by the rising sun.
“B’jour, Michié,” he said, and added in the English he had
picked up from the British traders, “the breakfas’ he is ready,
and Jean make him good. Will you have the grace to descen’?”
We went down the ladder into the cabin, where the odor of the
furs mingled with the smell of the cooking. There was a fricassee
steaming on the crane, some of Zéron’s bread, brought from St.
Louis, and coffee that Monsieur Gratiot had provided for our use.
We took our bowls and cups on deck and sat on the edge of the
cabin.
“By gad,” cried Nick, “it lacks but the one element to make it a
paradise.”
“And what is that?” I demanded.
“A woman,” said he.
Xavier, who overheard, gave a delighted laugh.
“Parbleu, Michié, you have right,” he said, “but Michié Gratiot,
he say no. In Nouvelle Orléans we find some.”
Nick got to his feet, and if anything he did could have
surprised me, I should have been surprised when he put his arm
coaxingly about Xavier’s neck. Xavier himself was surprised and
correspondingly delighted.
“Tell me, Xavier,” he said, with a look not to be resisted, “do
you think I shall find some beauties there?”
“Beauties!” exclaimed Xavier, “La Nouvelle Orléans — it is the
home of beauty, Michié. They promenade themselves on the levee,
they look down from ze gallerie, mais — "
“But what, Xavier?”
“But, mon Dieu, Michié, they are vair’ difficile. They are not
like Englis’ beauties, there is the father and the mother, and — the
convent.” And Xavier, who had a wen under his eye, laid his finger
on it.
“For shame, Xavier,” cried Nick; "and you are balked by such
things?”
Xavier thought this an exceedingly good joke, and he took his
pipe out of his mouth to laugh the better.
“Me? Mais non, Michié. And yet ze Alcalde, he mek me afraid.
Once he put me in ze calaboose when I tried to climb ze balcon’.”
Nick roared.
“I will show you how, Xavier,” he said; "as to climbing the
balconies, there is a convenance in it, as in all else. For
instance, one must be daring, and discreet, and nimble, and ready
to give the law a presentable answer, and lacking that, a piastre.
And then the fair one must be a fair one indeed.”
“Diable, Michié,” cried Xavier, “you are ze mischief.”
“Nay,” said Nick, “I learned it all and much more from my
cousin, Mr. Ritchie.”
Xavier stared at me for an instant, and considering that he knew
nothing of my character, I thought it extremely impolite of him to
laugh. Indeed, he tried to control himself, for some reason
standing in awe of my appearance, and then he burst out into such
loud haw-haws that the crew poked their heads above the cabin
hatch.
“Michié Reetchie,” said Xavier, and again he burst into laughter
that choked further speech. He controlled himself and laid his
finger on his wen.
“You don’t believe it,” said Nick, offended.
“Michié Reetchie a gallant!” said Xavier.
“An incurable,” said Nick, “an amazingly clever rogue at device
when there is a petticoat in it. Davy, do I do you justice?”
Xavier roared again.
“Quel maitre!” he said.
“Xavier,” said Nick, gently taking the tiller out of his hand,
"I will teach you how to steer a keel boat.”
“Mon Dieu,” said Xavier, “and who is to pay Michié Gratiot for
his fur? The river, she is full of things.”
“Yes, I know, Xavier, but you will teach me to steer.”
“Volontiers, Michié, as we go now. But there come a time when I,
even I, who am twenty year on her, do not know whether it is right
or left. Ze rock — he vair’ hard. Ze snag, he grip you like dat,”
and Xavier twined his strong arms around Nick until he was
helpless. "Ze bar — he hol’ you by ze leg. An’ who is to tell you
how far he run under ze yellow water, Michié? I, who speak to you,
know. But I know not how I know. Ze water, sometime she tell,
sometime she say not’ing.”
“A bas, Xavier!” said Nick, pushing him away, “I will teach you
the river.”
Xavier laughed, and sat down on the edge of the cabin. Nick took
easily to accomplishments, and he handled the clumsy tiller with a
certainty and distinction that made the boatmen swear in two
languages and a patois. A great water-logged giant of the Northern
forests loomed ahead of us. Xavier sprang to his feet, but Nick
had swung his boat swiftly, smoothly, into the deeper water on the
outer side.
“Saint Jacques, Michié,” cried Xavier, “you mek him better zan I
thought.”
Fascinated by a new accomplishment, Nick held to the tiller,
while Xavier with a trained eye scanned the troubled,
yellow-glistening surface of the river ahead. The wind died, the
sun beat down with a moist and venomous sting, and northeastward
above the edge of the bluff a bank of cloud like sulphur smoke was
lifted. Gradually Xavier ceased his jesting and became quiet.
“Looks like a hurricane,” said Nick.
“Mon Dieu,” said Xavier, “you have right, Michié,” and he called
in his rapid patois to the crew, who lounged forward in the
cabin’s shade. There came to my mind the memory of that hurricane
at Temple Bow long ago, a storm that seemed to have brought so
much sorrow into my life. I glanced at Nick, but his face was
serene.
The cloud-bank came on in black and yellow masses, and the
saffron light I recalled so well turned the living green of the
forest to a sickly pallor and the yellow river to a tinge scarce
to be matched on earth. Xavier had the tiller now, and the men
were straining at the oars to send the boat across the current
towards the nearer western shore. And as my glance took in the
scale of things, the miles of bluff frowning above the bottom, the
river that seemed now like a lake of lava gently boiling, and the
wilderness of the western shore that reached beyond the ken of
man, I could not but shudder to think of the conflict of nature’s
forces in such a place. A grim stillness reigned over all, broken
only now and again by a sharp command from Xavier. The men were
rowing for their lives, the sweat glistening on their red faces.
“She come,” said Xavier.
I looked, not to the northeast whence the banks of cloud had
risen, but to the southwest, and it seemed as though a little
speck was there against the hurrying film of cloud. We were
drawing near the forest line, where a little creek made an
indentation. I listened, and from afar came a sound like the
strumming of low notes on a guitar, and sad. The terrified scream
of a panther broke the silence of the forest, and then the other
distant note grew stronger, and stronger yet, and rose to a high
hum like unto no sound on this earth, and mingled with it now was
a lashing like water falling from a great height. We grounded, and
Xavier, seizing a great tow-rope, leaped into the shallow water
and passed the bight around a trunk. I cried out to Nick, but my
voice was drowned. He seized me and flung me under the cabin’s
lee, and then above the fearful note of the storm came cracklings
like gunshots of great trees snapping at their trunk. We saw the
forest wall burst out — how far away I know not — and the air was
filled as with a flock of giant birds, and boughs crashed on the
roof of the cabin and tore the water in the darkness. How long we
lay clutching each other in terror on the rocking boat I may not
say, but when the veil first lifted there was the river like an
angry sea, and limitless, the wind in its fury whipping the foam
from the crests and bearing it off into space. And presently, as
we stared, the note lowered and the wind was gone again, and there
was the water tossing foolishly, and we lay safe amidst the green
wreckage of the forest as by a miracle.
It was Nick who moved first. With white face he climbed to the
roof of the cabin and idly seizing the great limb that lay there
tried to move it. Xavier, who lay on his face on the bank, rose to
a sitting posture and crossed himself. Beyond me crowded the four
members of the crew, unhurt. Then we heard Xavier’s voice, in
French, thanking the Blessed Virgin for our escape.
Further speech was gone from us, for men do not talk after such
a matter. We laid hold of the tree across the cabin and,
straining, flung it over into the water. A great drop of rain hit
me on the forehead, and there came a silver-gray downpour that
blotted out the scene and drove us down below. And then, from
somewhere in the depths of the dark cabin, came a sound to make a
man’s blood run cold.
“What’s that?” I said, clutching Nick.
“Benjy,” said he; "thank God he did not die of fright.” We
lighted a candle, and poking around, found the negro where he had
crept into the farthest corner of a bunk with his face to the
wall. And when we touched him he gave vent to a yell that was
blood-curdling.
“I’se a bad nigger, Lo’d, yes, I is,” he moaned. "I ain’t fit
fo’ jedgment, Lo’d.”
Nick shook him and laughed.
“Come out of that, Benjy,” he said; "you’ve got another chance.”
Benjy turned, perforce, the whites of his eyes gleaming in the
candle-light, and stared at us.
“You ain’t gone yit, Marse,” he said.
“Gone where?” said Nick.
“I’se done been tole de quality ’ll be jedged fust, Marse.”
Nick hauled him out on the floor. Climbing to the deck, we found
that the boat was already under way, running southward in the
current through the misty rain. And gazing shoreward, a sight met
my eyes which I shall never forget. A wide vista, carpeted with
wreckage, was cut through the forest to the river’s edge, and the
yellow water was strewn for miles with green boughs. We stared
down it, overwhelmed, until we had passed beyond its line.
“It is as straight,” said Nick, “as straight as one of her
Majesty’s alleys I saw cut through the forest at Saint-Cloud.”
Had I space and time to give a faithful account of this journey
it would be chiefly a tribute to Xavier’s skill, for they who have
not put themselves at the mercy of the Mississippi in a small
craft can have no idea of the dangers of such a voyage. Infinite
experience, a keen eye, a steady hand, and a nerve of iron are
required. Now, when the current swirled almost to a rapid, we
grazed a rock by the width of a ripple; and again, despite the
effort of Xavier and the crew, we would tear the limbs from a huge
tree, which, had we hit it fair, would have ripped us from bow to
stern. Once, indeed, we were fast on a sand-bar, whence (as Nick
said) Xavier fairly cursed us off. We took care to moor at night,
where we could be seen as little as possible from the river, and
divided the watches lest we should be surprised by Indians. And,
as we went southward, our hands and faces became blotched all over
by the bites of mosquitoes and flies, and we smothered ourselves
under blankets to get rid of them. At times we fished, and one
evening, after we had passed the expanse of water at the mouth of
the Ohio, Nick pulled a hideous thing from the inscrutable yellow
depths, — a slimy, scaleless catfish. He came up like a log, and
must have weighed seventy pounds. Xavier and his men and myself
made two good meals of him, but Nick would not touch the meat.
The great river teemed with life. There were flocks of herons
and cranes and water pelicans, and I know not what other birds,
and as we slipped under the banks we often heard the paroquets
chattering in the forests. And once, as we drifted into an inlet
at sunset, we caught sight of the shaggy head of a bear above the
brown water, and leaping down into the cabin I primed the rifle
that stood there and shot him. It took the seven of us to drag him
on board, and then I cleaned and skinned him as Tom had taught me,
and showed Jean how to put the caul fat and liver in rows on a
skewer and wrap it in the bear’s handkerchief and roast it before
the fire. Nick found no difficulty in eating this — it was a dish
fit for any gourmand.
We passed the great, red Chickasaw Bluff, which sits facing
westward looking over the limitless Louisiana forests, where new
and wondrous vines and flowers grew, and came to the beautiful
Walnut Hills crowned by a Spanish fort. We did not stop there to
exchange courtesies, but pressed on to the Grand Gulf, the grave
of many a keel boat before and since. This was by far the most
dangerous place on the Mississippi, and Xavier was never weary of
recounting many perilous escapes there, or telling how such and
such a priceless cargo had sunk in the mud by reason of the lack
of skill of particular boatmen he knew of. And indeed, the
Canadian’s face assumed a graver mien after the Walnut Hills were
behind us.
“You laugh, Michié,” he said to Nick, a little resentfully. "I
who speak to you say that there is four foot on each side of ze
bateau. Too much tafia, a little too much excite — " and he made a
gesture with his hand expressive of total destruction; "ze
tornado, I would sooner have him — "
“Bah!” said Nick, stroking Xavier’s black beard, “give me the
tiller. I will see you through safely, and we will not spare the
tafia either.” And he began to sing a song of Xavier’s own: —
“’Marianson, dame jolie,
Ou est alle votre mari?’"
“Ah, toujours les dames!” said Xavier. “
But I tell you, Michié,
le diable, — he is at ze bottom of ze Grand Gulf and his mouth
open — so.” And he suited the action to the word.
At night we tied up under the shore within earshot of the mutter
of the place, and twice that night I awoke with clinched hands
from a dream of being spun fiercely against the rock of which
Xavier had told, and sucked into the devil’s mouth under the
water. Dawn came as I was fighting the mosquitoes, — a still, sultry
dawn with thunder muttering in the distance.
We breakfasted in silence, and with the crew standing ready at
the oars and Xavier scanning the wide expanse of waters ahead,
seeking for that unmarked point whence to embark on this perilous
journey, we floated down the stream. The prospect was sufficiently
disquieting on that murky day. Below us, on the one hand, a rocky
bluff reached out into the river, and on the far side was a
timber-clad point round which the Mississippi doubled and flowed
back on itself. It needed no trained eye to guess at the perils of
the place. On the one side the mighty current charged against the
bluff and, furious at the obstacle, lashed itself into a hundred
sucks and whirls, their course marked by the flotsam plundered
from the forests above. Woe betide the boat that got into this
devil’s caldron! And on the other side, near the timbered point,
ran a counter current marked by forest wreckage flowing up-stream.
To venture too far on this side was to be grounded or at least to
be sent back to embark once more on the trial.
But where was the channel? We watched Xavier with bated breath.
Not once did he take his eyes from the swirling water ahead, but
gave the tiller a touch from time to time, now right, now left,
and called in a monotone for the port or starboard oars. Nearer
and nearer we sped, dodging the snags, until the water boiled
around us, and suddenly the boat shot forward as in a mill-race,
and we clutched the cabin’s roof. A triumphant gleam was in
Xavier’s eyes, for he had hit the channel squarely. And then, like
a monster out of the deep, the scaly, black back of a great
northern pine was flung up beside us and sheered us across the
channel until we were at the very edge of the foam-specked,
spinning water. But Xavier saw it, and quick as lightning brought
his helm over and laughed as he heard it crunching along our keel.
And so we came swiftly around the bend and into safety once more.
The next day there was the Petite Gulf, which bothered Xavier very
little, and the day after that we came in sight of Natchez on her
heights and guided our boat in amongst the others that lined the
shore, scowled at by lounging Indians there, and eyed suspiciously
by a hatchet-faced Spaniard in a tawdry uniform who represented
his Majesty’s customs. Here we stopped for a day and a night that
Xavier and his crew might get properly drunk on tafia, while Nick
and I walked about the town and waited until his Excellency, the
commandant, had finished dinner that we might present our letters
and obtain his passport. Natchez at that date was a sufficiently
unkempt and evil place of dirty, ramshackle houses and gambling
dens, where men of the four nations gamed and quarrelled and
fought. We were glad enough to get away the following morning,
Xavier somewhat saddened by the loss of thirty livres of which he
had no memory, and Nick and myself relieved at having the
passports in our pockets. I have mine yet among my papers.
“Natchez, 29 de Junio, de 1789.
“Concedo libre y seguro paeaporte a Don David Ritchie para que
pase a la Nueva Orleans por Agna. Pido y encargo no se le ponga
embarazo.”
A few days more and we were running between low shores which
seemed to hold a dark enchantment. The rivers now flowed out of,
and not into the Mississippi, and Xavier called them bayous, and
often it took much skill and foresight on his part not to be shot
into the lane they made in the dark forest of an evening. And the
forest, — it seemed an impenetrable mystery, a strange tangle of
fantastic growths: the live-oak (chene vert), its wide-spreading
limbs hung funereally with Spanish moss and twined in the
mistletoe’s death embrace; the dark cypress swamp with the
conelike knees above the yellow back-waters; and here and there
grew the bridelike magnolia which we had known in Kentucky,
wafting its perfume over the waters, and wondrous flowers and
vines and trees with French names that bring back the scene to me
even now with a whiff of romance, bois d’arc, lilac, grande
volaille (water-lily). Birds flew hither and thither (the names of
every one of which Xavier knew), — the whistling papabot, the
mournful bittern (garde-soleil), and the night-heron (grosbeck),
who stood like a sentinel on the points.
One night I awoke with the sweat starting from my brow, trying
to collect my senses, and I lay on my blanket listening to such
plaintive and heart-rending cries as I had never known. Human
cries they were, cries as of children in distress, and I rose to a
sitting posture on the deck with my hair standing up straight, to
discover Nick beside me in the same position.
“God have mercy on us,” I heard him mutter, “what’s that? It
sounds like the wail of all the babies since the world began.”
We listened together, and I can give no notion of the hideous
mournfulness of the sound. We lay in a swampy little inlet, and
the forest wall made a dark blur against the star-studded sky.
There was a splash near the boat that made me clutch my legs, the
wails ceased and began again with redoubled intensity. Nick and I
leaped to our feet and stood staring, horrified, over the gunwale
into the black water. Presently there was a laugh behind us, and
we saw Xavier resting on his elbow.
“What devil-haunted place is this?” demanded Nick.
“Ha, ha,” said Xavier, shaking with unseemly mirth, “you have
never heard ze alligator sing, Michié?”
“Alligator!” cried Nick; "there are babies in the water, I tell
you.”
“Ha, ha,” laughed Xavier, flinging off his blanket and searching
for his flint and tinder. He lighted a pine knot, and in the red
pulsing flare we saw what seemed to be a dozen black logs floating
on the surface. And then Xavier flung the cresset at them, fire
and all. There was a lashing, a frightful howl from one of the
logs, and the night’s silence once more.
Often after that our slumbers were disturbed, and we would rise
with maledictions in our mouths to fling the handiest thing at the
serenaders. When we arose in the morning we would often see them
by the dozens, basking in the shallows, with their wide mouths
flapped open waiting for their prey. Sometimes we ran upon them in
the water, where they looked like the rough-bark pine logs from
the North, and Nick would have a shot at them. When he hit one
fairly there would be a leviathan-like roar and a churning of the
river into suds.
At length there were signs that we were drifting out of the
wilderness, and one morning we came in sight of a rich plantation
with its dark orange trees and fields of indigo, with its
wide-galleried manor-house in a grove. And as we drifted we heard
the negroes chanting at their work, the plaintive cadence of the
strange song adding to the mystery of the scene. Here in truth was
a new world, a land of peaceful customs, green and moist. The
soft-toned bells of it seemed an expression of its life, — so far
removed from our own striving and fighting existence in Kentucky.
Here and there, between plantations, a belfry could be seen above
the cluster of the little white village planted in the green; and
when we went ashore amongst these simple French people they
treated us with such gentle civility and kindness that we would
fain have lingered there. The river had become a vast yellow lake,
and often as we drifted of an evening the wail of a slave dance
and monotonous beating of a tom-tom would float to us over the
water.
At last, late one afternoon, we came in sight of that strange
city which had filled our thoughts for many days.
NICK AND I stood by the mast on the forward part of the cabin,
staring at the distant, low-lying city, while Xavier sought for
the entrance to the eddy which here runs along the shore. If you
did not gain this entrance, — so he explained, — you were carried by a
swift current below New Orleans and might by no means get back
save by the hiring of a crew. Xavier, however, was not to be
caught thus, and presently we were gliding quietly along the
eastern bank, or levee, which held back the river from the
lowlands. Then, as we looked, the levee became an esplanade shaded
by rows of willows, and through them we caught sight of the upper
galleries and low, curving roofs of the city itself. There, cried
Xavier, was the Governor’s house on the corner, where the great
Miro lived, and beyond it the house of the Intendant; and then,
gliding into an open space between the keel boats along the bank,
stared at by a score of boatmen and idlers from above, we came to
the end of our long journey. No sooner had we made fast than we
were boarded by a shabby customs officer who, when he had seen our
passports, bowed politely and invited us to land. We leaped
ashore, gained the gravelled walk on the levee, and looked about
us.
Squalidity first met our eyes. Below us, crowded between the
levee and the row of houses, were dozens of squalid market-stalls
tended by cotton-clad negroes. Beyond, across the bare Place
d’Armes, a blackened gap in the line of houses bore witness to the
devastation of the year gone by, while here and there a roof,
struck by the setting sun, gleamed fiery red with its new tiles.
The levee was deserted save for the negroes and the river men.
“Time for siesta, Michié,” said Xavier, joining us; "I will show
you ze inn of which I spik. She is kep’ by my fren’, Madame
Bouvet.”
“Xavier,” said Nick, looking at the rolling flood of the river,
"suppose this levee should break?”
“Ah,” said Xavier, “then some Spaniard who never have a bath — he
feel what water is lak.”
Followed by Benjy with the saddle-bags, we went down the steps
set in the levee into this strange, foreign city. It was like unto
nothing we had ever seen, nor can I give an adequate notion of how
it affected us, — such a mixture it seemed of dirt and poverty and
wealth and romance. The narrow, muddy streets ran with filth, and
on each side along the houses was a sun-baked walk held up by the
curved sides of broken flatboats, where two men might scarcely
pass. The houses, too, had an odd and foreign look, some of wood,
some of upright logs and plaster, and newer ones, Spanish in
style, of adobe, with curving roofs of red tiles and strong eaves
spreading over the banquette (as the sidewalk was called), casting
shadows on lemon-colored walls. Since New Orleans was in a swamp,
the older houses for the most part were lifted some seven feet
above the ground, and many of these houses had wide galleries on
the street side. Here and there a shop was set in the wall; a
watchmaker was to be seen poring over his work at a tiny window, a
shoemaker cross-legged on the floor. Again, at an open wicket, we
caught a glimpse through a cool archway into a flowering
court-yard. Stalwart negresses with bright kerchiefs made way for
us on the banquette. Hands on hips, they swung along erect, with
baskets of cakes and sweetmeats on their heads, musically crying
their wares.
At length, turning a corner, we came to a white wooden house on
the Rue Royale, with a flight of steps leading up to the entrance.
In place of a door a flimsy curtain hung in the doorway, and,
pushing this aside, we followed Xavier through a darkened hall to
a wide gallery that overlooked a court-yard. This court-yard was
shaded by several great trees which grew there, the house and
gallery ran down one other side of it; and the two remaining sides
were made up of a series of low cabins, these forming the various
outhouses and the kitchen. At the far end of this gallery a
sallow, buxom lady sat sewing at a table, and Xavier saluted her
very respectfully.
“Madame,” he said, “I have brought you from St. Louis with
Michié Gratiot’s compliments two young American gentlemen, who are
travelling to amuse themselves.”
The lady rose and beamed upon us.
“From Monsieur Gratiot,” she said; "you are very welcome,
gentlemen, to such poor accommodations as I have. It is not
unusual to have American gentlemen in New Orleans, for many come
here first and last. And I am happy to say that two of my best
rooms are vacant. Zoey!”
There was a shrill answer from the court below, and a negro girl
in a yellow turban came running up, while Madame Bouvet bustled
along the gallery and opened the doors of two darkened rooms.
Within I could dimly see a walnut dresser, a chair, and a walnut
bed on which was spread a mosquito bar.
“Voila! Messieurs,” cried Madame Bouvet, “there is still a
little time for a siesta. No siesta!” cried Madame, eying us
aghast; "ah, the Americans they never rest — never.”
We bade farewell to the good Xavier, promising to see him soon;
and Nick, shouting to Benjy to open the saddle-bags, proceeded to
array himself in the clothes which had made so much havoc at St.
Louis. I boded no good from this proceeding, but I reflected, as I
watched him dress, that I might as well try to turn the
Mississippi from its course as to attempt to keep my cousin from
the search for gallant adventure. And I reflected that his
indulgence in pleasure-seeking would serve the more to divert any
suspicions which might fall upon my own head. At last, when the
setting sun was flooding the court-yard, he stood arrayed upon the
gallery, ready to venture forth to conquest.
Madame Bouvet’s tavern, or hotel, or whatever she was pleased to
call it, was not immaculately clean. Before passing into the
street we stood for a moment looking into the public room on the
left of the hallway, a long saloon, evidently used in the early
afternoon for a dining room, and at the back of it a wide,
many-paned window, capped by a Spanish arch, looked out on the
gallery. Near this window was a gay party of young men engaged at
cards, waited on by the yellow-turbaned Zoey, and drinking what
evidently was claret punch. The sounds of their jests and laughter
pursued us out of the house.
The town was waking from its siesta, the streets filling, and
people stopped to stare at Nick as we passed. But Nick, who was
plainly in search of something he did not find, hurried on. We
soon came to the quarter which had suffered most from the fire,
where new houses had gone up or were in the building beside the
blackened logs of many of Bienville’s time. Then we came to a high
white wall that surrounded a large garden, and within it was a
long, massive building of some beauty and pretension, with a high,
latticed belfry and heavy walls and with arched dormers in the
sloping roof. As we stood staring at it through the iron grille
set in the archway of the lodge, Nick declared that it put him in
mind of some of the châteaux he had seen in France, and he crossed
the street to get a better view of the premises. An old man in
coarse blue linen came out of the lodge and spoke to me.
“It is the convent of the good nuns, the Ursulines, Monsieur,”
he said in French, “and it was built long ago in the Sieur de
Bienville’s time, when the colony was young. For forty-five years,
Monsieur, the young ladies of the city have come here to be
educated.”
“What does he say?” demanded Nick, pricking up his ears as he
came across the street.
“That young men have been sent to the mines of Brazil for
climbing the walls,” I answered.
“Who wants to climb the walls?” said Nick, disgusted.
“The young ladies of the town go to school here,” I answered;
"it is a convent.”
“It might serve to pass the time,” said Nick, gazing with a new
interest at the latticed windows. "How much would you take, my
friend, to let us in at the back way this evening?” he demanded of
the porter in French.
The good man gasped, lifted his hands in horror, and straightway
let loose upon Nick a torrent of French invectives that had not
the least effect except to cause a blacksmith’s apprentice and two
negroes to stop and stare at us.
“Pooh!” exclaimed Nick, when the man had paused for want of
breath, “it is no trick to get over that wall.”
“Bon Dieu!” cried the porter, “you are Kentuckians, yes? I might
have known that you were Kentuckians, and I shall advise the good
sisters to put glass on the wall and keep a watch.”
“The young ladies are beautiful, you say?” said Nick.
At this juncture, with the negroes grinning and the porter near
bursting with rage, there came out of the lodge the fattest woman
I have ever seen for her size. She seized her husband by the back
of his loose frock and pulled him away, crying out that he was
losing time by talking to vagabonds, besides disturbing the good
sisters. Then we went away, Nick following the convent wall down
to the river. Turning southward under the bank past the huddle of
market-stalls, we came suddenly upon a sight that made us pause
and wonder.
New Orleans was awake. A gay and laughing throng paced the
esplanade on the levee under the willows, with here and there a
cavalier on horseback on the Royal Road below. Across the Place
d’Armes the spire of the parish church stood against the fading
sky, and to the westward the mighty river stretched away like a
gilded floor. It was a strange throng. There were grave Spaniards
in long cloaks and feathered beavers; jolly merchants and artisans
in short linen jackets, each with his tabatiere, the wives with
bits of finery, the children laughing and shouting and dodging in
and out between fathers and mothers beaming with quiet pride and
contentment; swarthy boat-men with their worsted belts, gaudy
negresses chanting in the soft patois, and here and there a
blanketed Indian. Nor was this all. Some occasion (so Madame
Bouvet had told us) had brought a sprinkling of fashion to town
that day, and it was a fashion to astonish me. There were fine
gentlemen with swords and silk waistcoats and silver shoe-buckles,
and ladies in filmy summer gowns. Greuze ruled the mode in France
then, but New Orleans had not got beyond Watteau. As for Nick and
me, we knew nothing of Greuze and Watteau then, and we could only
stare in astonishment. And for once we saw an officer of the
Louisiana Regiment resplendent in a uniform that might have served
at court.
Ay, and there was yet another sort. Every flatboatman who
returned to Kentucky was full of tales of the marvellous beauty of
the quadroons and octoroons, stories which I had taken with a
grain of salt; but they had not indeed been greatly overdrawn. For
here were these ladies in the flesh, their great, opaque, almond
eyes consuming us with a swift glance, and each walking with a
languid grace beside her duenna. Their faces were like old ivory,
their dress the stern Miro himself could scarce repress. In former
times they had been lavish in their finery, and even now earrings
still gleamed and color broke out irrepressibly.
Nick was delighted, but he had not dragged me twice the length
of the esplanade ere his eye was caught by a young lady in pink
who sauntered between an elderly gentleman in black silk and a
young man more gayly dressed.
“Egad,” said Nick, “there is my divinity, and I need not look a
step farther.”
I laughed.
“You have but to choose, I suppose, and all falls your way,” I
answered.
“But look!” he cried, halting me to stare after the girl, “what
a face, and what a form! And what a carriage, by Jove! There is
breeding for you! And Davy, did you mark the gentle, rounded arm?
Thank heaven these short sleeves are the fashion.”
“You are mad, Nick,” I answered, pulling him on, “these people
are not to be stared at so. And once I present our letters to
Monsieur de Saint-Gré, it will not be difficult to know any of
them.”
“Look!” said he, “that young man, lover or husband, is a brute.
On my soul, they are quarrelling.”
The three had stopped by a bench under a tree. The young man,
who wore claret silk and a sword, had one of those thin faces of
dirty complexion which show the ravages of dissipation, and he was
talking with a rapidity and vehemence of which only a Latin tongue
will admit. We could see, likewise, that the girl was answering
with spirit, — indeed, I should write a stronger word than
spirit, — while the elderly gentleman, who had a good-humored,
fleshy face and figure, was plainly doing his best to calm them
both. People who were passing stared curiously at the three.
“Your divinity evidently has a temper,” I remarked.
“For that scoundel — certainly,” said Nick; "but come, they are
moving on.”
“You mean to follow them?” I exclaimed.
“Why not?” said he. "We will find out where they live and who
they are, at least.”
“And you have taken a fancy to this girl?”
“I have looked them all over, and she’s by far the best I’ve
seen. I can say so much honestly.”
“But she may be married,” I said weakly.
“Tut, Davy,” he answered, “it’s more than likely, from the
violence of their quarrel. But if so, we will try again.”
“We!” I exclaimed.
“Oh, come on!” he cried, dragging me by the sleeve, “or we shall
lose them.”
I resisted no longer, but followed him down the levee, in my
heart thanking heaven that he had not taken a fancy to an
octoroon. Twilight had set in strongly, the gay crowd was
beginning to disperse, and in the distance the three figures could
be seen making their way across the Place d’Armes, the girl
hanging on the elderly gentleman’s arm, and the young man
following with seeming sullenness behind. They turned into one of
the narrower streets, and we quickened our steps. Lights gleamed
in the houses; voices and laughter, and once the tinkle of a
guitar came to us from court-yard and gallery. But Nick, hurrying
on, came near to bowling more than one respectable citizen we met
on the banquette, into the ditch. We reached a corner, and the
three were nowhere to be seen.
“Curse the luck!” cried Nick, “we have lost them. The next time
I’ll stop for no explanations.”
There was no particular reason why I should have been penitent,
but I ventured to say that the house they had entered could not be
far off.
“And how the devil are we to know it?” demanded Nick.
This puzzled me for a moment, but presently I began to think
that the two might begin quarrelling again, and said so. Nick
laughed and put his arm around my neck.
“You have no mean ability for intrigue when you put your mind to
it, Davy,” he said; "I vow I believe you are in love with the girl
yourself.”
I disclaimed this with some vehemence. Indeed, I had scarcely
seen her.
“They can’t be far off,” said Nick; "we’ll pitch on a likely
house and camp in front of it until bedtime.”
“And be flung into a filthy calaboose by a constable,” said I.
"No, thank you.”
We walked on, and halfway down the block we came upon a new
house with more pretensions than its neighbors. It was set back a
little from the street, and there was a high adobe wall into which
a pair of gates were set, and a wicket opening in one of them.
Over the wall hung a dark fringe of magnolia and orange boughs. On
each of the gate-posts a crouching lion was outlined dimly against
the fainting light, and, by crossing the street, we could see the
upper line of a latticed gallery under the low roof. We took our
stand within the empty doorway of a blackened house, nearly
opposite, and there we waited, Nick murmuring all sorts of
ridiculous things in my ear. But presently I began to reflect upon
the consequences of being taken in such a situation by a constable
and dragged into the light of a public examination. I put this to
Nick as plainly as I could, and was declaring my intention of
going back to Madame Bouvet’s, when the sound of voices arrested
me. The voices came from the latticed gallery, and they were low
at first, but soon rose to such an angry pitch that I made no
doubt we had hit on the right house after all. What they said was
lost to us, but I could distinguish the woman’s voice, low-pitched
and vibrant as though insisting upon a refusal, and the man’s
scarce adult tones, now high as though with balked passion, now
shaken and imploring. I was for leaving the place at once, but
Nick clutched my arm tightly; and suddenly, as I stood undecided,
the voices ceased entirely, there were the sounds of a scuffle,
and the lattice of the gallery was flung open. In the all but
darkness we saw a figure climb over the railing, hang suspended
for an instant, and drop lightly to the ground. Then came the
light relief of a woman’s gown in the opening of the lattice, the
cry "Auguste, Auguste!” the wicket in the gate opened and slammed,
and a man ran at top speed along the banquette towards the levee.
Instinctively I seized Nick by the arm as he started out of the
doorway.
“Let me go,” he cried angrily, “let me go, Davy.”
But I held on.
“Are you mad?” I said.
He did not answer, but twisted and struggled, and before I knew
what he was doing he had pushed me off the stone step into a
tangle of blackened beams behind. I dropped his arm to save
myself, and it was mere good fortune that I did not break an ankle
in the fall. When I had gained the step again he was gone after
the man, and a portly citizen stood in front of me, looking into
the doorway.
“Qu’est-ce-qu’il-y-a la dedans?” he demanded sharply.
It was a sufficiently embarrassing situation. I put on a bold
front, however, and not deigning to answer, pushed past him and
walked with as much leisure as possible along the banquette in the
direction which Nick had taken. As I turned the corner I glanced
over my shoulder, and in the darkness I could just make out the
man standing where I had left him. In great uneasiness I pursued
my way, my imagination summing up for Nick all kinds of adventures
with disagreeable consequences. I walked for some time — it may have
been half an hour — aimlessly, and finally decided it would be best
to go back to Madame Bouvet’s and await the issue with as much
calmness as possible. He might not, after all, have caught the
fellow.
There were few people in the dark streets, but at length I met a
man who gave me directions, and presently found my way back to my
lodging place. Talk and laughter floated through the latticed
windows into the street, and when I had pushed back the curtain
and looked into the saloon I found the same gaming party at the
end of it, sitting in their shirt-sleeves amidst the moths and
insects that hovered around the candles.
“Ah, Monsieur,” said Madame Bouvet’s voice behind me, “you must
excuse them. They will come here and play, the young gentlemen,
and I cannot find it in my heart to drive them away, though
sometimes I lose a respectable lodger by their noise. But, after
all, what would you?” she added with a shrug; "I love them, the
young men. But, Monsieur,” she cried, “you have had no supper! And
where is Monsieur your companion? Comme il est beau garcon!”
“He will be in presently,” I answered with unwarranted
assumption.
Madame shot at me the swiftest of glances and laughed, and I
suspected that she divined Nick’s propensity for adventure.
However, she said nothing more than to bid me sit down at the
table, and presently Zoey came in with lights and strange, highly
seasoned dishes, which I ate with avidity, notwithstanding my
uneasiness of mind, watching the while the party at the far end of
the room. There were five young gentlemen playing a game I knew
not, with intervals of intense silence, and boisterous laughter
and execrations while the cards were being shuffled and the money
rang on the board and glasses were being filled from a stand at
one side. Presently Madame Bouvet returned, and placing before me
a cup of wondrous coffee, advanced down the room towards them.
“Ah, Messieurs,” she cried, “you will ruin my poor house.”
The five rose and bowed with marked profundity. One of them,
with a puffy, weak, good-natured face, answered her briskly, and
after a little raillery she came back to me. I had a question not
over discreet on my tongue’s tip.
“There are some fine residences going up here, Madame,” I said.
“Since the fire, Monsieur, the dreadful fire of Good Friday a
year ago. You admire them?”
“I saw one,” I answered with indifference, “with a wall and
lions on the gate-posts — "
“Mon Dieu, that is a house,” exclaimed Madame; "it belongs to
Monsieur de Saint-Gré.”
“To Monsieur de Saint-Gré!” I repeated.
She shot a look at me. She had bright little eyes like a bird’s,
that shone in the candlelight.
“You know him, Monsieur?”
“I heard of him in St. Louis,” I answered.
“You will meet him, no doubt,” she continued. "He is a very fine
gentleman. His grandfather was Commissary-general of the colony,
and he himself is a cousin of the Marquis de Saint-Gré, who has
two châteaux, a house in Paris, and is a favorite of the King.”
She paused, as if to let this impress itself upon me, and added
archly, “Tenez, Monsieur, there is a daughter — "
She stopped abruptly.
I followed her glance, and my first impression — of
claret-color — gave me a shock. My second confirmed it, for in the
semi-darkness beyond the rays of the candle was a thin, eager
face, prematurely lined, with coal-black, lustrous eyes that spoke
eloquently of indulgence. In an instant I knew it to be that of
the young man whom I had seen on the levee.
“Monsieur Auguste?” stammered Madame.
“Bon soir, Madame,” he cried gayly, with a bow; "diable, they
are already at it, I see, and the punch in the bowl. I will win
back to-night what I have lost by a week of accursed luck.”
“Monsieur your father has relented, perhaps,” said Madame,
deferentially.
“Relented!” cried the young man, “not a sou. C’est egal! I have
the means here,” and he tapped his pocket, “I have the means here
to set me on my feet again, Madame.”
He spoke with a note of triumph, and Madame took a curious step
towards him.
“Qu’est-ce-que c’est, Monsieur Auguste?” she inquired.
He drew something that glittered from his pocket and beckoned to
her to follow him down the room, which she did with alacrity.
“Ha, Adolphe,” he cried to the young man of the puffy face, “I
will have my revenge to-night. Voila!!” and he held up the shining
thing, “this goes to the highest bidder, and you will agree that
it is worth a pretty sum.”
They rose from their chairs and clustered around him at the
table, Madame in their midst, staring with bent heads at the
trinket which he held to the light. It was Madame’s voice I heard
first, in a kind of frightened cry.
“Mon Dieu, Monsieur Auguste, you will not part with that!” she
exclaimed.
“Why not?” demanded the young man, indifferently. "It was
painted by Boze, the back is solid gold, and the Jew in the Rue
Toulouse will give me four hundred livres for it to-morrow
morning.”
There followed immediately such a chorus of questions,
exclamations, and shrill protests from Madame Bouvet, that I
(being such a laborious French scholar) could distinguish but
little of what they said. I looked in wonderment at the
gesticulating figures grouped against the light, Madame imploring,
the youthful profile of the newcomer marked with a cynical and
scornful refusal. More than once I was for rising out of my chair
to go over and see for myself what the object was, and then,
suddenly, I perceived Madame Bouvet coming towards me in evident
agitation. She sank into the chair beside me.
“If I had four hundred livres,” she said, “if I had four hundred
livres!”
“And what then?” I asked.
“Monsieur,” she said, “a terrible thing has happened. Auguste de
Saint-Gré — "
“Auguste de Saint-Gré!” I exclaimed.
“He is the son of that Monsieur de Saint-Gré of whom we spoke,”
she answered, “a wild lad, a spendthrift, a gambler, if you like.
And yet he is a Saint-Gré, Monsieur, and I cannot refuse him. It
is the miniature of Mademoiselle Hélène de Saint-Gré, the daughter
of the Marquis, sent to Mamselle ’Toinette, his sister, from
France. How he has obtained it I know not.”
“Ah!” I exclaimed sharply, the explanation of the scene of which
I had been a witness coming to me swiftly. The rascal had wrenched
it from her in the gallery and fled.
“Monsieur,” continued Madame, too excited to notice my
interruption, “if I had four hundred livres I would buy it of him,
and Monsieur de Saint-Gré pere would willingly pay it back in the
morning.”
I reflected. I had a letter in my pocket to Monsieur de
Saint-Gré, the sum was not large, and the act of Monsieur Auguste
de Saint-Gré in every light was detestable. A rising anger decided
me, and I took a wallet from my pocket.
“I will buy the miniature, Madame,” I said.
She looked at me in astonishment.
“God bless you, Monsieur,” she cried; "if you could see Mamselle
’Toinette you would pay twice the sum. The whole town loves her.
Monsieur Auguste, Monsieur Auguste!” she shouted, “here is a
gentleman who will buy your miniature.”
The six young men stopped talking and stared at me With one
accord. Madame arose, and I followed her down the room towards
them, and, had it not been for my indignation, I should have felt
sufficiently ridiculous. Young Monsieur de Saint-Gré came forward
with the good-natured, easy insolence to which he had been born,
and looked me over.
“Monsieur is an American,” he said.
“I understand that you have offered this miniature for four
hundred livres,” I said.
“It is the Jew’s price,” he answered; "mais pardieu, what will
you?” he added with a shrug, “I must have the money. Regardez,
Monsieur, you have a bargain. Here is Mademoiselle Hélène de
Saint-Gré, daughter of my lord the Marquis of whom I have the
honor to be a cousin,” and he made a bow. "It is by the famous
court painter, Joseph Boze, and Mademoiselle de Saint-Gré herself
is a favorite of her Majesty.” He held the portrait close to the
candle and regarded it critically. "Mademoiselle Hélène Victoire
Marie de Saint-Gré, painted in a costume of Henry the Second’s
time, with a ruff, you notice, which she wore at a ball given by
his Highness the Prince of Conde at Chantilly. A trifle haughty,
if you like, Monsieur, but I venture to say you will be hopelessly
in love with her within the hour.”
At this there was a general titter from the young gentlemen at
the table.
“All of which is neither here nor there, Monsieur,” I answered
sharply. "The question is purely a commercial one, and has nothing
to do with the lady’s character or position.”
“It is well said, Monsieur,” Madame Bouvet put in.
Monsieur Auguste de Saint-Gré shrugged his slim shoulders and
laid down the portrait on the walnut table.
“Four hundred livres, Monsieur,” he said.
I counted out the money, scrutinized by the curious eyes of his
companions, and pushed it over to him. He bowed carelessly, sat
him down, and began to shuffle the cards, while I picked up the
miniature and walked out of the room. Before I had gone twenty
paces I heard them laughing at their game and shouting out the
stakes. Suddenly I bethought myself of Nick. What if he should
come in and discover the party at the table? I stopped short in
the hallway, and there Madame Bouvet overtook me.
“How can I thank you, Monsieur?” she said. And then, “You will
return the portrait to Monsieur de Saint-Gré?”
“I have a letter from Monsieur Gratiot to that gentleman, which
I shall deliver in the morning,” I answered. "And now, Madame, I
have a favor to ask of you.”
“I am at Monsieur’s service,” she answered simply.
“When Mr. Temple comes in, he is not to go into that room,” I
said, pointing to the door of the saloon; "I have my reasons for
requesting it.”
For answer Madame went to the door, closed it, and turned the
key. Then she sat down beside a little table with a candlestick
and took up her knitting.
“It will be as Monsieur says,” she answered.
I smiled.
“And when Mr. Temple comes in will you kindly say that I am
waiting for him in his room?” I asked.
“As Monsieur says,” she answered. "I wish Monsieur a good-night
and pleasant dreams.”
She took a candlestick from the table, lighted the candle, and
handed it me with a courtesy. I bowed, and made my way along the
gallery above the deserted court-yard. Entering my room and
closing the door after me, I drew the miniature from my pocket and
stood gazing at it for I know not how long.
I STOOD staring at the portrait, I say, with a kind of
fascination that astonished me, seeing that it had come to me in
such a way. It was no French face of my imagination, and as I
looked it seemed to me that I knew Mademoiselle Hélène de
Saint-Gré. And yet I smile as I write this, realizing full well
that my strange and foreign surroundings and my unforeseen
adventure had much to do with my state of mind. The lady in the
miniature might have been eighteen, or thirty-five. Her features
were of the clearest cut, the nose the least trifle aquiline, and
by a blurred outline the painter had given to the black hair piled
high upon the head a suggestion of waviness. The eyebrows were
straight, the brown eyes looked at the world with an almost
scornful sense of humor, and I marked that there was determination
in the chin. Here was a face that could be infinitely haughty or
infinitely tender, a mouth of witty — nay, perhaps cutting — repartee
of brevity and force. A lady who spoke quickly, moved quickly, or
reposed absolutely. A person who commanded by nature and yet (dare
I venture the thought?) was capable of a supreme surrender. I was
aroused from this odd revery by footsteps on the gallery, and Nick
burst into the room. Without pausing to look about him, he flung
himself lengthwise on the bed on top of the mosquito bar.
“A thousand curses on such a place,” he cried; "it is full of
rat holes and rabbit warrens.”
“Did you catch your man?” I asked innocently.
“Catch him!” said Nick, with a little excusable profanity; "he
went in at one end of such a warren and came out at another. I
waited for him in two streets until an officious person chanced
along and threatened to take me before the Alcalde. What the devil
is that you have got in your hand, Davy?” he demanded, raising his
head.
“A miniature that took my fancy, and which I bought.”
He rose from the bed, yawned, and taking it in his hand, held it
to the light. I watched him curiously.
“Lord,” he said, “it is such a passion as I might have suspected
of you, Davy.”
“There was nothing said about passion,” I answered
“Then why the deuce did you buy it?” he said with some
pertinence.
This staggered me.
“A man may fancy a thing, without indulging in a passion, I
suppose,” I replied.
Nick held the picture at arm’s length in the palm of his hand
and regarded it critically.
“Faith,” said he, “you may thank heaven it is only a picture. If
such a one ever got hold of you, Davy, she would general you even
as you general me. Egad,” he added with a laugh, “there would be
no more walking the streets at night in search of adventure for
you. Consider carefully the masterful features of that lady and
thank God you haven’t got her.”
I was inclined to be angry, but ended by laughing.
“There will be no rivalry between us, at least,” I said.
“Rivalry!” exclaimed Nick. "Heaven forbid that I should aspire
to such abject slavery. When I marry, it will be to command.”
“All the more honor in such a conquest,” I suggested.
“Davy,” said he, “I have long been looking for some such flaw in
your insuperable wisdom. But I vow I can keep my eyes open no
longer. Benjy!”
A smothered response came from the other side of the wall, and
Benjy duly appeared in the doorway, blinking at the candlelight,
to put his master to bed.
We slept that night with no bed covering save the mosquito bar,
as was the custom in New Orleans. Indeed, the heat was most
oppressive, but we had become to some extent inured to it on the
boat, and we were both in such sound health that our slumbers were
not disturbed. Early in the morning, however, I was awakened by a
negro song from the court-yard, and I lay pleasantly for some
minutes listening to the early sounds, breathing in the aroma of
coffee which mingled with the odor of the flowers of the court,
until Zoey herself appeared in the doorway, holding a cup in her
hand. I arose, and taking the miniature from the table, gazed at
it in the yellow morning light; and then, having dressed myself, I
put it carefully in my pocket and sat down at my portfolio to
compose a letter to Polly Ann, knowing that a description of what
I had seen in New Orleans would amuse her. This done, I went out
into the gallery, where Madame was already seated at her knitting,
in the shade of the great tree that stood in the corner of the
court and spread its branches over the eaves. She arose and
courtesied, with a questioning smile.
“Madame,” I asked, “is it too early to present myself to
Monsieur de Saint-Gré?”
“Pardieu, no, Monsieur, we are early risers in the South for we
have our siesta. You are going to return the portrait, Monsieur?”
I nodded.
“God bless you for the deed,” said she. "Tenez, Monsieur,” she
added, stepping closer to me, “you will tell his father that you
bought it from Monsieur Auguste?”
I saw that she had a soft spot in her heart for the rogue.
“I will make no promises, Madame,” I answered.
She looked at me timidly, appealingly, but I bowed and departed.
The sun was riding up into the sky, the walls already glowing with
his heat, and a midsummer languor seemed to pervade the streets as
I walked along. The shadows now were sharply defined, the
checkered foliage of the trees was flung in black against the
yellow-white wall of the house with the lions, and the
green-latticed gallery which we had watched the night before
seemed silent and deserted. I knocked at the gate, and presently a
bright-turbaned gardienne opened it.
Was Monsieur de Saint-Gré at home. The gardienne looked me over,
and evidently finding me respectable, replied with many
protestations of sorrow that he was not, that he had gone with
Mamselle very early that morning to his country place at Les Iles.
This information I extracted with difficulty, for I was not by any
means versed in the negro patois.
As I walked back to Madame Bouvet’s I made up my mind that there
was but the one thing to do, to go at once to Monsieur de
Saint-Gré’s plantation. Finding Madame still waiting in the
gallery, I asked her to direct me thither.
“You have but to follow the road that runs southward along the
levee, and some three leagues will bring you to it, Monsieur. You
will inquire for Monsieur de Saint-Gré.”
“Can you direct me to Mr. Daniel Clark’s?” I asked.
“The American merchant and banker, the friend and associate of
the great General Wilkinson whom you sent down to us last year?
Certainly, Monsieur. He will no doubt give you better advice than
I on this matter.”
I found Mr. Clark in his counting-room, and I had not talked
with him five minutes before I began to suspect that, if a
treasonable understanding existed between Wilkinson and the
Spanish government, Mr. Clark was innocent of it. He being the
only prominent American in the place, it was natural that
Wilkinson should have formed with him a business arrangement to
care for the cargoes he sent down. Indeed, after we had sat for
some time chatting together, Mr. Clark began himself to make
guarded inquiries on this very subject. Did I know Wilkinson? How
was his enterprise of selling Kentucky products regarded at home?
But I do not intend to burden this story with accounts of a matter
which, though it has never been wholly clear, has been long since
fairly settled in the public mind. Mr. Clark was most amiable,
accepted my statement that I was travelling for pleasure, and
honored Monsieur Chouteau’s bon (for my purchase of the miniature
had deprived me of nearly all my ready money), and said that Mr.
Temple and I would need horses to get to Les Iles.
“And unless you purpose going back to Kentucky by keel boat, or
round by sea to Philadelphia or New York, and cross the
mountains,” he said, “you will need good horses for your journey
through Natchez and the Cumberland country. There is a consignment
of Spanish horses from the westward just arrived in town,” he
added, “and I shall be pleased to go with you to the place where
they are sold. I shall not presume to advise a Kentuckian on such
a purchase.”
The horses were crowded together under a dirty shed near the
levee, and the vessel from which they had been landed rode at
anchor in the river. They were the scrawny, tough ponies of the
plains, reasonably cheap, and it took no great discernment on my
part to choose three of the strongest and most intelligent
looking. We went next to a saddler’s, where I selected three
saddles and bridles of Spanish workmanship, and Mr. Clark agreed
to have two of his servants meet us with the horses before Madame
Bouvet’s within the hour. He begged that we would dine with him
when we returned from Les Iles.
“You will not find an island, Mr. Ritchie,” he said;
"Saint-Gré’s plantation is a huge block of land between the river
and a cypress swamp behind. Saint-Gré is a man with a wonderful
quality of mind, who might, like his ancestors, have made his mark
if necessity had probed him or opportunity offered. He never
forgave the Spanish government for the murder of his father, nor
do I blame him. He has his troubles. His son is an incurable rake
and degenerate, as you may have heard.”
I went back to Madame Bouvet’s, to find Nick emerging from his
toilet.
“What deviltry have you been up to, Davy?” he demanded.
“I have been to the House of the Lions to see your divinity,” I
answered, “and in a very little while horses will be here to carry
us to her.”
“What do you mean?” he asked, grasping me by both shoulders.
“I mean that we are going to her father’s plantation, some way
down the river.”
“On my honor, Davy, I did not suspect you of so much
enterprise,” he cried. "And her husband — ?”
“Does not exist,” I replied. "Perhaps, after all, I might be
able to give you instruction in the conduct of an adventure. The
man you chased with such futility was her brother, and he stole
from her the miniature of which I am now the fortunate possessor.”
He stared at me for a moment in rueful amazement.
“And her name?” he demanded.
“Antoinette de Saint-Gré,” I answered; "our letter is to her
father.”
He made me a rueful bow.
“I fear that I have undervalued you, Mr. Ritchie,” he said. "You
have no peer. I am unworthy to accompany you, and furthermore, it
would be useless.”
“And why useless!” I inquired, laughing.
“You have doubtless seen the lady, and she is yours, said he.
“You forget that I am in love with a miniature,” I said.
In half an hour we were packed and ready, the horses had
arrived, we bade good-by to Madame Bouvet and rode down the miry
street until we reached the road behind the levee. Turning
southward, we soon left behind the shaded esplanade and the city’s
roofs below us, and came to the first of the plantation houses set
back amidst the dark foliage. No tremor shook the fringe of moss
that hung from the heavy boughs, so still was the day, and an
indefinable, milky haze stretched between us and the cloudless sky
above. The sun’s rays pierced it and gathered fire; the mighty
river beside us rolled listless and sullen, flinging back the heat
defiantly. And on our left was a tropical forest in all its
bewildering luxuriance, the live-oak, the hackberry, the myrtle,
the Spanish bayonet in bristling groups, and the shaded places
gave out a scented moisture like an orangery; anon we passed
fields of corn and cotton, swamps of rice, stretches of
poverty-stricken indigo plants, gnawed to the stem by the pest.
Our ponies ambled on, unmindful; but Nick vowed that no woman
under heaven would induce him to undertake such a journey again.
Some three miles out of the city we descried two figures on
horseback coming towards us, and quickly perceived that one was a
gentleman, the other his black servant. They were riding at a more
rapid pace than the day warranted, but the gentleman reined in his
sweating horse as he drew near to us, eyed us with a curiosity
tempered by courtesy, bowed gravely, and put his horse to a canter
again.
“Phew!” said Nick, twisting in his saddle, “I thought that all
Creoles were lazy.”
“We have met the exception, perhaps,” I answered. "Did you take
in that man?”
“His looks were a little remarkable, come to think of it,”
answered Nick, settling down into his saddle again.
Indeed, the man’s face had struck me so forcibly that I was
surprised out of an inquiry which I had meant to make of him,
namely, how far we were from the Saint-Gré plantation. We pursued
our way slowly, from time to time catching a glimpse of a dwelling
almost hid in the distant foliage, until at length we came to a
place a little more pretentious than those which we had seen. From
the road a graceful flight of wooden steps climbed the levee and
descended on the far side to a boat landing, and a straight vista
cut through the grove, lined by wild orange trees, disclosed the
white pillars and galleries of a far-away plantation house. The
grassy path leading through the vista was trimly kept, and on
either side of it in the moist, green shade of the great trees
flowers bloomed in a profusion of startling colors, — in splotches
of scarlet and white and royal purple.
Nick slipped from his horse.
“Behold the mansion of Mademoiselle de Saint-Gré,” said he,
waving his hand up the vista.
“How do you know?” I asked.
“I am told by a part of me that never lies, Davy,” he answered,
laying his hand upon his heart; "and besides,” he added, “I should
dislike devilishly to go too far on such a day and have to come
back again.”
“We will rest here,” I said, laughing, “and send in Benjy to
find out.”
“Davy,” he answered, with withering contempt, “you have no more
romance in you than a turnip. We will go ourselves and see what
befalls.”
“Very well, then,” I answered, falling in with his humor, “we
will go ourselves.”
He brushed his face with his handkerchief, gave himself a pull
here and a pat there, and led the way down the alley. But we had
not gone far before he turned into a path that entered the grove
on the right, and to this likewise I made no protest. We soon
found ourselves in a heavenly spot, — sheltered from the sun’s rays
by a dense verdure, — and no one who has not visited these Southern
country places can know the teeming fragrance there. One shrub
(how well I recall it!) was like unto the perfume of all the
flowers and all the fruits, the very essence of the delicious
languor of the place that made our steps to falter. A bird shot a
bright flame of color through the checkered light ahead of us.
Suddenly a sound brought us to a halt, and we stood in a tense and
wondering silence. The words of a song, sung carelessly in a
clear, girlish voice, came to us from beyond.
“Je voudrais bien me marier,
Je voudrais bien me marier,
Mais j’ai qrand’ peur de me tromper:
Mais j’ai grand’ peur de me tromper:
Ils sont si malhonnetes!
Ma luron, ma lurette,
Ils sont si malhonnetes!
Ma luron, ma lure.”
“We have come at the very zenith of opportunity,” I whispered.
“Hush!” he said.
“Je ne veux pas d’un avocat,
Je ne veux pas d’un avocat,
Car ils aiment trop les ducats,
Car ils aiment trop les ducats,
Ils trompent les fillettes,
Ma luron, ma lurette,
Ils trompent les fillettes,
Ma luron, ma lure.”
“Eliminating Mr. Ritchie, I believe,” said Nick, turning on me
with a grimace. "But hark again!”
“Je voudrais bien d’un officier:
Je voudrais bien d’un officier:
Je marcherais a pas carres,
Je marcherais a pas carres,
Dans ma joli’ chambrette,
Ma luron, ma lurette
Dans ma joli’ chambrette,
Ma luron, ma lure.”
The song ceased with a sound that was half laughter, half sigh.
Before I realized what he was doing, Nick, instead of retracing
his steps towards the house, started forward. The path led through
a dense thicket which became a casino hedge, and suddenly I found
myself peering over his shoulder into a little garden bewildering
in color. In the centre of the garden a great live-oak spread its
sheltering branches. Around the gnarled trunk was a seat. And on
the seat, — her sewing fallen into her lap, her lips parted, her
eyes staring wide, sat the young lady whom we had seen on the
levee the evening before. And Nick was making a bow in his
grandest manner.
“Hélas, Mademoiselle,” he said,
“je ne suis pas officier, mais
on peut arranger tout cela, sans doute.”
My breath was taken away by this unheard-of audacity, and I
braced myself against screams, flight, and other feminine
demonstrations of terror. The young lady did nothing of the kind.
She turned her back to us, leaned against the tree, and to my
astonishment I saw her slim shoulders shaken with laughter. At
length, very slowly, she looked around, and in her face struggled
curiosity and fear and merriment. Nick made another bow, worthy of
Versailles, and she gave a frightened little laugh.
“You are English, Messieurs — yes?” she ventured.
“We were once!” cried Nick, “but we have changed, Mademoiselle.”
“Et quoi donc?” relapsing into her own language.
“Americans,” said he. “Allow me to introduce to you the
Honorable David Ritchie, whom you rejected a few moments ago.”
“Whom I rejected?” she exclaimed.
“Alas,” said Nick, with a commiserating glance at me, “he has
the misfortune to be a lawyer.”
Mademoiselle shot at me the swiftest and shyest of glances, and
turned to us once more her quivering shoulders. There was a brief
silence.
“Mademoiselle?” said Nick, taking a step on the garden path.
“Monsieur?” she answered, without so much as looking around.
“What, now, would you take this gentleman to be?” he asked with
an insistence not to be denied.
Again she was shaken with laughter, and suddenly to my surprise
she turned and looked full at me.
“In English, Monsieur, you call it — a gallant?”
My face fairly tingled, and I heard Nick laughing with unseemly
merriment.
“Ah, Mademoiselle,” he cried, “you are a judge of character, and
you have read him perfectly.”
“Then I must leave you, Messieurs,” she answered, with her eyes
in her lap. But she made no move to go.
“You need have no fear of Mr. Ritchie, Mademoiselle,” answered
Nick, instantly. "I am here to protect you against his gallantry.”
This time Nick received the glance, and quailed before it.
“And who — par exemple — is to protect me against — you, Monsieur?”
she asked in the lowest of voices.
“You forget that I, too, am unprotected — and vulnerable,
Mademoiselle,” he answered.
Her face was hidden again, but not for long.
“How did you come?” she demanded presently.
“On air,” he answered, “for we saw you in New Orleans
yesterday.”
“And — why?”
“Need you ask, Mademoiselle?” said the rogue, and then, with
more effrontery than ever, he began to sing: —
“‘Je voudrais bien me marier,
Je voudrais bien me marier,
Mais j’ai grand’ peur de me tromper.’"
She rose, her sewing falling to the ground, and took a few
startled steps towards us.
“Monsieur! you will be heard,” she cried.
“And put out of the Garden of Eden,” said Nick.
“I must leave you,” she said, with the quaintest of English
pronunciation.
Yet she stood irresolute in the garden path, a picture against
the dark green leaves and the flowers. Her age might have been
seventeen. Her gown was of some soft and light material printed in
buds of delicate color, her slim arms bare above the elbow. She
had the ivory complexion of the province, more delicate than I had
yet seen, and beyond that I shall not attempt to describe her,
save to add that she was such a strange mixture of innocence and
ingenuousness and coquetry as I had not imagined. Presently her
gaze was fixed seriously on me.
“Do you think it very wrong, Monsieur?” she asked.
I was more than taken aback by this tribute.
“Oh,” cried Nick, “the arbiter of etiquette!”
“Since I am here, Mademoiselle,” I answered, with anything but
readiness, “I am not a proper judge.”
Her next question staggered me.
“You are well-born?” she asked.
“Mr. Ritchie’s grandfather was a Scottish earl,” said Nick,
immediately, a piece of news that startled me into protest. "It is
true, Davy, though you may not know it,” he added.
“And you, Monsieur?” she said to Nick.
“I am his cousin, — is it not honor enough?” said he.
“Yet you do not resemble one another.”
“Mr. Ritchie has all the good looks in the family,” said Nick.
“Oh!” cried the young lady, and this time she gave us her
profile.
“Come, Mademoiselle,” said Nick, “since the fates have cast the
die, let us all sit down in the shade. The place was made for us.”
“Monsieur!” she cried, giving back, “I have never in my life
been alone with gentlemen.”
“But Mr. Ritchie is a duenna to satisfy the most exacting,” said
Nick; "when you know him better you will believe me.”
She laughed softly and glanced at me. By this time we were all
three under the branches.
“Monsieur, you do not understand the French customs. Mon Dieu,
if the good Sister Lorette could see me now — "
“But she is safe in the convent,” said Nick. "Are they going to
put glass on the walls?”
“And why?” asked Mademoiselle, innocently.
“Because,” said Nick, “because a very bad man has come to New
Orleans, — one who is given to climbing walls.”
“You?”
“Yes. But when I found that a certain demoiselle had left the
convent, I was no longer anxious to climb them.”
“And how did you know that I had left it?”
I was at a loss to know whether this were coquetry or innocence.
“Because I saw you on the levee,” said Nick.
“You saw me on the levee?” she repeated, giving back.
“And I had a great fear,” the rogue persisted.
“A fear of what?”
“A fear that you were married,” he said, with a boldness that
made me blush. As for Mademoiselle, a color that vied with the
June roses charged through her cheeks. She stooped to pick up her
sewing, but Nick was before her.
“And why did you think me married?” she asked in a voice so low
that we scarcely heard.
“Faith,” said Nick, “because you seemed to be quarrelling with a
man.”
She turned to him with an irresistible seriousness.
“And is that your idea of marriage, Monsieur?”
This time it was I who laughed, for he had been hit very fairly.
“Mademoiselle,” said he, “I did not for a moment think it could
have been a love match.”
Mademoiselle turned away and laughed.
“You are the very strangest man I have ever seen,” she said.
“Shall I give you my notion of a love match, Mademoiselle?” said
Nick.
“I should think you might be well versed in the subject,
Monsieur,” she answered, speaking to the tree, “but here is
scarcely the time and place.” She wound up her sewing, and faced
him. "I must really leave you,” she said.
He took a step towards her and stood looking down into her face.
Her eyes dropped.
“And am I never to see you again?” he asked.
“Monsieur!” she cried softly, “I do not know who you are.” She
made him a courtesy, took a few steps in the opposite path, and
turned. "That depends upon your ingenuity,” she added; "you seem
to have no lack of it, Monsieur.”
Nick was transported.
“You must not go,” he cried.
“Must not? How dare you speak to me thus, Monsieur?” Then she
tempered it. "There is a lady here whom I love, and who is ill. I
must not be long from her bedside.”
“She is very ill?” said Nick, probably for want of something
better.
“She is not really ill, Monsieur, but depressed — is not that the
word? She is a very dear friend, and she has had trouble — so much,
Monsieur, — and my mother brought her here. We love her as one of
the family.”
This was certainly ingenuous, and it was plain that the girl
gave us this story through a certain nervousness, for she twisted
her sewing in her fingers as she spoke.
“Mademoiselle,” said Nick, “I would not keep you from such an
errand of mercy.”
She gave him a grateful look, more dangerous than any which had
gone before.
“And besides,” he went on, “we have come to stay awhile with
you, Mr. Ritchie and myself.”
“You have come to stay awhile?” she said.
I thought it time that the farce were ended.
“We have come with letters to your father, Monsieur de
Saint-Gré, Mademoiselle,” I said, “and I should like very much to
see him, if he is at leisure.”
Mademoiselle stared at me in unfeigned astonishment.
“But did you not meet him, Monsieur?” she demanded. "He left an
hour ago for New Orleans. You must have met a gentleman riding
very fast.”
It was my turn to be astonished.
“But that was not your father!” I exclaimed.
“Et pourquoi non?” she said.
“Is not your father the stout gentleman whom I saw with you on
the levee last evening?” I asked.
She laughed.
“You have been observing, Monsieur,” she said. "That was my
uncle, Monsieur de Beausejour. You saw me quarrelling with my
brother, Auguste,” she went on a little excitedly. "Oh, I am very
much ashamed of it. I was so angry. My cousin, Mademoiselle Hélène
de Saint-Gré, has just sent me from France such a beautiful
miniature, and Auguste fell in love with it.”
“Fell in love with it!” I exclaimed involuntarily.
“You should see it, Monsieur, and I think you also would fall in
love with it.”
“I have not a doubt of it,” said Nick.
Mademoiselle made the faintest of moues.
“Auguste is very wild, as you say,” she continued, addressing
me, “he is a great care to my father. He intrigues, you know, he
wishes Louisiane to become French once more, — as we all do. But I
should not say this, Monsieur,” she added in a startled tone. "You
will not tell? No, I know you will not. We do not like the
Spaniards. They killed my grandfather when they came to take the
province. And once, the Governor-general Miro sent for my father
and declared he would put Auguste in prison if he did not behave
himself. But I have forgotten the miniature. When Auguste saw that
he fell in love with it, and now he wishes to go to France and
obtain a commission through our cousin, the Marquis of Saint-Gré,
and marry Mademoiselle Hélène.”
“A comprehensive programme, indeed,” said Nick.
“My father has gone back to New Orleans,” she said, “to get the
miniature from Auguste. He took it from me, Monsieur.” She raised
her head a little proudly. "If my brother had asked it, I might
have given it to him, though I treasured it. But Auguste is
so — impulsive. My uncle told my father, who is very angry. He will
punish Auguste severely, and — I do not like to have him punished.
Oh, I wish I had the miniature.”
“Your wish is granted, Mademoiselle,” I answered, drawing the
case from my pocket and handing it to her.
She took it, staring at me with eyes wide with wonder, and then
she opened it mechanically.
“Monsieur,” she said with great dignity, “do you mind telling me
where you obtained this?”
“I found it, Mademoiselle,” I answered; and as I spoke I felt
Nick’s fingers on my arm.
“You found it? Where? How, Monsieur?”
“At Madame Bouvet’s, the house where we stayed.”
“Oh,” she said with a sigh of relief, “he must have dropped it.
It is there where he meets his associates, where they talk of the
French Louisiane.”
Again I felt Nick pinching me, and I gave a sigh of relief.
Mademoiselle was about to continue, but I interrupted her.
“How long will your father be in New Orleans, Mademoiselle?” I
asked.
“Until he finds Auguste,” she answered. "It may be days, but he
will stay, for he is very angry. But will you not come into the
house, Messieurs, and be presented to my mother?” she asked. "I
have been very — inhospitable,” she added with a glance at Nick.
We followed her through winding paths bordered by shrubs and
flowers, and presently came to a low house surrounded by a wide,
cool gallery, and shaded by spreading trees. Behind it were
clustered the kitchens and quarters of the house servants.
Mademoiselle, picking up her dress, ran up the steps ahead of us
and turned to the left in the hall into a darkened parlor. The
floor was bare, save for a few mats, and in the corner was a
massive escritoire of mahogany with carved feet, and there were
tables and chairs of a like pattern. It was a room of more
distinction than I had seen since I had been in Charlestown, and
reflected the solidity of its owners.
“If you will be so kind as to wait here, Messieurs,” said
Mademoiselle, “I will call my mother.”
And she left us.
I sat down, rather uncomfortably, but Nick took a stand and
stood staring down at me with folded arms.
“How I have undervalued you, Davy,” he said.
“I am not proud of it,” I answered shortly.
“What the deuce is to do now!” he asked.
“I cannot linger here,” I answered; "I have business with
Monsieur de Saint-Gré, and I must go back to New Orleans at once.”
“Then I will wait for you,” said Nick. "Davy, I have met my
fate.”
I laughed in spite of myself.
“It seems to me that I have heard that remark before,” I
answered.
He had not time to protest, for we heard footsteps in the hall,
and Mademoiselle entered, leading an older lady by the hand. In
the light of the doorway I saw that she was thin and small and
yellow, but her features had a regularity and her mien a dignity
which made her impressing, which would have convinced a stranger
that she was a person of birth and breeding. Her hair, tinged with
gray, was crowned by a lace cap.
“Madame,” I said, bowing and coming forward, “I am David
Ritchie, from Kentucky, and this is my cousin, Mr. Temple, of
Charlestown. Monsieur Gratiot and Colonel Chouteau, of St. Louis,
have been kind enough to give us letters to Monsieur de
Saint-Gré.” And I handed her one of the letters which I had ready.
“You are very welcome, Messieurs,” she answered, with the same
delightful accent which her daughter had used, “and you are
especially welcome from such a source. The friends of Colonel
Chouteau and of Monsieur Gratiot are our friends. You will remain
with us, I hope, Messieurs,” she continued. "Monsieur de Saint-Gré
will return in a few days at best.”
“By your leave, Madame, I will go to New Orleans at once and try
to find Monsieur,” I said, “for I have business with him.”
“You will return with him, I hope,” said Madame.
I bowed.
“And Mr. Temple will remain?” she asked, with a questioning look
at Nick.
“With the greatest pleasure in the world, Madame,” he answered,
and there was no mistaking his sincerity. As he spoke,
Mademoiselle turned her back on him.
I would not wait for dinner, but pausing only for a sip of cool
Madeira and some other refreshment, I made my farewells to the
ladies. As I started out of the door to find Benjy, who had been
waiting for more than an hour, Mademoiselle gave me a neatly
folded note.
“You will be so kind as to present that to my father, Monsieur,”
she said.
CHAPTER XIII.
monsieur auguste entrapped
IT MAY be well to declare here and now that I do not intend to
burden this story with the business which had brought me to New
Orleans. While in the city during the next few days I met a young
gentleman named Daniel Clark, a nephew of that Mr. Clark of whom I
have spoken. Many years after the time of which I write this Mr.
Daniel Clark the younger, who became a rich merchant and an able
man of affairs, published a book which sets forth with great
clearness proofs of General Wilkinson’s duplicity and treason, and
these may be read by any who would satisfy himself further on the
subject. Mr. Wharton had not believed, nor had I flattered myself
that I should be able to bring such a fox as General Wilkinson to
earth. Abundant circumstantial evidence I obtained: Wilkinson’s
intimacy with Miro was well known, and I likewise learned that a
cipher existed between them. The permit to trade given by Miro to
Wilkinson was made no secret of. In brief, I may say that I
discovered as much as could be discovered by any one without
arousing suspicion, and that the information with which I returned
to Kentucky was of some material value to my employers.
I have to thank Monsieur Philippe de St. Gré for a great deal.
And I take this opportunity to set down the fact that I have
rarely met a more remarkable man.
As I rode back to town alone a whitish film was spread before
the sun, and ere I had come in sight of the fortifications the low
forest on the western bank was a dark green blur against the sky.
The esplanade on the levee was deserted, the willow trees had a
mournful look, while the bright tiles of yesterday seemed to have
faded to a sombre tone. I spied Xavier on a bench smoking with
some friends of his.
“He make much rain soon, Michié,” he cried. "You hev good time,
I hope, Michié.”
I waved my hand and rode on, past the Place d’Armes with its
white diagonal bands strapping its green like a soldiers front,
and as I drew up before the gate of the House of the Lions the
warning taps of the storm were drumming on the magnolia leaves.
The same gardienne came to my knock, and in answer to her shrill
cry a negro lad appeared to hold my horse. I was ushered into a
brick-paved archway that ran under the latticed gallery toward a
flower-filled court-yard, but ere we reached this the gardienne
turned to the left up a flight of steps with a delicate balustrade
which led to an open gallery above. And there stood the gentleman
whom we had met hurrying to town in the morning. A gentleman he
was, every inch of him. He was dressed in black silk, his hair in
a cue, and drawn away from a face of remarkable features. He had a
high-bridged nose, a black eye that held an inquiring sternness, a
chin indented, and a receding forehead. His stature was
indeterminable. In brief, he might have stood for one of those
persons of birth and ability who become prime ministers of France.
“Monsieur de St. Gré?” I said.
He bowed gracefully, but with a tinge of condescension. I was
awed, and considering the relations which I had already had with
his family, I must admit that I was somewhat frightened.
“Monsieur,” I said, “I bring letters to you from Monsieur
Gratiot and Colonel Chouteau of St. Louis. One of these I had the
honor to deliver to Madame de St. Gré, and here is the other.”
“Ah,” he said, with another keen glance, “I met you this
morning, did I not?”
“You did, Monsieur.”
He broke the seal, and, going to the edge of the gallery, held
the letter to the light. As he read a peal of thunder broke
distantly, the rain came down in a flood. Then he folded the paper
carefully and turned to me again.
“You will make my house your home, Mr. Ritchie,” he said;
"recommended from such a source, I will do all I can to serve you.
But where is this Mr. Temple of whom the letter speaks? His family
in Charlestown is known to me by repute.”
“By Madame de St. Gré’s invitation he remained at Les Iles,” I
answered, speaking above the roar of the rain.
“I was just going to the table,” said Monsieur de St. Gré; "we
will talk as we eat.”
He led the way into the dining room, and as I stood on the
threshold a bolt of great brilliancy lighted its yellow-washed
floor and walnut furniture of a staid pattern. A deafening crash
followed as we took our seats, while Monsieur de St. Gré’s man
lighted four candles of green myrtle-berry wax.
“Monsieur Gratiot’s letter speaks vaguely of politics, Mr.
Ritchie,” began Monsieur de St. Gré. He spoke English perfectly,
save for an occasional harsh aspiration which I cannot imitate.
Directing his man to fetch a certain kind of Madeira, he turned
to me with a look of polite inquiry which was scarcely reassuring.
And I reflected, the caution with which I had been endowed coming
uppermost, that the man might have changed since Monsieur Gratiot
had seen him. He had, moreover, the air of a man who gives a
forced attention, which seemed to me the natural consequences of
the recent actions of his son.
“I fear that I am intruding upon your affairs, Monsieur,” I
answered.
“Not at all, sir,” he said politely. "I have met that charming
gentleman, Mr. Wilkinson, who came here to brush away the causes
of dissension, and cement a friendship between Kentucky and
Louisiana.”
It was most fortunate that the note of irony did not escape me.
“Where governments failed, General Wilkinson succeeded,” I
answered dryly.
Monsieur de St. Gré glanced at me, and an enigmatical smile
spread over his face. I knew then that the ice was cracked between
us. Yet he was too much a man of the world not to make one more
tentative remark.
“A union between Kentucky and Louisiana would be a resistless
force in the world, Mr. Ritchie,” he said.
“It was Nebuchadnezzar who dreamed of a composite image,
Monsieur,” I answered; "and Mr. Wilkinson forgets one thing, — that
Kentucky is a part of the United States.”
At that Monsieur St. Gré laughed outright. He became a different
man, though he lost none of his dignity.
“I should have had more faith in my old friend Gratiot,” he
said; "but you will pardon me if I did not recognize at once the
statesman he had sent me, Mr. Ritchie.”
It was my turn to laugh.
“Monsieur,” he went on, returning to that dignity of mien which
marked him, “my political opinions are too well known that I
should make a mystery of them to you. I was born a Frenchman, I
shall die a Frenchman, and I shall never be happy until Louisiana
is French once more. My great-grandfather, a brother of the
Marquis de St. Gré of that time, and a wild blade enough, came out
with D’Iberville. His son, my grandfather, was the
Commissary-general of the colony under the Marquis de Vaudreuil.
He sent me to France for my education, where I was introduced at
court by my kinsman, the old Marquis, who took a fancy to me and
begged me to remain. It was my father’s wish that I should return,
and I did not disobey him. I had scarcely come back, Monsieur,
when that abominable secret bargain of Louis the Fifteenth became
known, ceding Louisiana to Spain. You may have heard of the
revolution which followed here. It was a mild affair, and the
remembrance of it makes me smile to this day, though with
bitterness. I was five and twenty, hot-headed, and French. Que
voulez-vous?” and Monsieur de St. Gré shrugged his shoulders.
"O’Reilly, the famous Spanish general, came with his men-of-war.
Well I remember the days we waited with leaden hearts for the
men-of-war to come up from the English turn; and I can see now the
cannon frowning from the ports, the grim spars, the high poops
crowded with officers, the great anchors splashing the yellow
water. I can hear the chains running. The ships were in line of
battle before the town, their flying bridges swung to the levee,
and they loomed above us like towering fortresses. It was dark,
Monsieur, such as this afternoon, and we poor French colonists
stood huddled in the open space below, waiting for we knew not
what.”
He paused, and I started, for the picture he drew had carried me
out of myself.
“On the 18th of August, 1769, — well I remember the day,” Monsieur
de St. Gré continued, “the Spanish troops landed late in the
afternoon, twenty-six hundred strong, the artillery rumbling over
the bridges, the horses wheeling and rearing. And they drew up as
in line of battle in the Place d’Armes, — dragoons,
fusileros de montañas,
light and heavy infantry. Where were our white cockades
then? Fifty guns shook the town, the great O’Reilly limped ashore
through the smoke, and Louisiana was lost to France. We had a
cowardly governor, Monsieur, whose name is written in the annals
of the province in letters of shame. He betrayed Monsieur de St.
Gré and others into O’Reilly’s hands, and when my father was cast
into prison he was seized with such a fit of anger that he died.”
Monsieur de St. Gré was silent. Without, under the eaves of the
gallery, a white rain fell, and a steaming moisture arose from the
court-yard.
“What I have told you, Monsieur, is common knowledge. Louisiana
has been Spanish for twenty years. I no longer wear the white
cockade, for I am older now.” He smiled. "Strange things are
happening in France, and the old order to which I belong" (he
straightened perceptibly) "seems to be tottering. I have ceased to
intrigue, but thank God I have not ceased to pray. Perhaps — who
knows? — perhaps I may live to see again the lily of France stirred
by the river breeze.”
He fell into a revery, his fine head bent a little, but
presently aroused himself and eyed me curiously. I need not say
that I felt a strange liking for Monsieur de St. Gré.
“And now, Mr. Ritchie,” he said, “will you tell me who you are,
and how I can serve you?”
The servant had put the coffee on the table and left the room.
Monsieur de St. Gré himself poured me a cup from the dainty,
quaintly wrought Louis Quinze coffeepot, graven with the coat of
arms of his family. As we sat talking, my admiration for my host
increased, for I found that he was familiar not only with the
situation in Kentucky, but that he also knew far more than I of
the principles and personnel of the new government of which
General Washington was President. That he had little sympathy with
government by the people was natural, for he was a Creole, and
behind that a member of an order which detested republics. When we
were got beyond these topics the rain had ceased, the night had
fallen, the green candles had burned low. And suddenly, as he
spoke of Les Isles, I remembered the note Mademoiselle had given
me for him, and I apologized for my forgetfulness. He read it, and
dropped it with an exclamation.
“My daughter tells me that you have returned to her a miniature
which she lost, Monsieur,” he said.
“I had that pleasure,” I answered.
“And that — you found this miniature at Madame Bouvet’s. Was this
the case?” And he stared hard at me.
I nodded, but for the life of me I could not speak. It seemed an
outrage to lie to such a man. He did not answer, but sat lost in
thought, drumming with his fingers on the tables until the noise
of the slamming of a door aroused him to a listening posture. The
sound of subdued voices came from the archway below us, and one of
these, from an occasional excited and feminine note, I thought to
be the gardienne’s. Monsieur de St. Gré thrust back his chair, and
in three strides was at the edge of the gallery.
“Auguste!” he cried.
Silence.
“Auguste, come up to me at once,” he said in French.
Another silence, then something that sounded like “Sapristi!” a
groan from the gardienne, and a step was heard on the stairway. My
own discomfort increased, and I would have given much to be in any
other place in the world. Auguste had arrived at the head of the
steps but was apparently unable to get any farther.
“Bon soir, mon père,” he said.
“Like a dutiful son,” said Monsieur de St. Gré, “you heard I was
in town, and called to pay your respects, I am sure. I am
delighted to find you. In fact, I came to town for that purpose.”
“Lisette — ” began Auguste.
“Thought that I did not wish to be disturbed, no doubt,” said
his father. “Walk in, Auguste.”
Monsieur Auguste’s slim figure appeared in the doorway. He
caught sight of me, halted, backed, and stood staring with widened
eyes. The candles threw their light across his shoulder on the
face of the elder Monsieur de St. Gré. Auguste was a replica of
his father, with the features minimized to regularity and the brow
narrowed. The complexion of the one was a clear saffron, while the
boy’s skin was mottled, and he was not twenty.
“What is the matter?” said Monsieur de St. Gré.
“You — you have a visitor!” stammered Auguste, with a tact that
savored of practice. Yet there was a sorry difference between this
and the haughty young patrician who had sold me the miniature.
“Who brings me good news,” said Monsieur de St. Gré, in English.
"Mr. Ritchie, allow me to introduce my son, Auguste.”
I felt Monsieur de St. Gré’s eyes on me as I bowed, and I began
to think I was in near as great a predicament as Auguste. Monsieur
de St. Gré was managing the matter with infinite wisdom.
“Sit down, my son,” he said; "you have no doubt been staying
with your uncle.” Auguste sat down, still staring.
“Does your aunt’s health mend?”
“She is better to-night, father,” said the son, in English which
might have been improved.
“I am glad of it,” said Monsieur de St. Gré, taking a chair.
"Andreacute;, fill the glasses.”
The silent, linen-clad mulatto poured out the Madeira, shot a
look at Auguste, and retired softly.
“There has been a heavy rain, Monsieur,” said Monsieur de St.
Gre to me, “but I think the air is not yet cleared. I was about to
say, Mr. Ritchie, when my son called to pay his respects, that the
miniature of which we were speaking is one of the most remarkable
paintings I have ever seen.” Auguste’s thin fingers were clutching
the chair. "I have never beheld Mademoiselle Hélène de St. Gré,
for my cousin, the Marquis, was not married when I left France. He
was a captain in a regiment of his Majesty’s Mousquetaires, since
abolished. But I am sure that the likeness of Mademoiselle must be
a true one, for it has the stamp of a remarkable personality,
though Hélène can be only eighteen. Women, with us, mature
quickly, Monsieur. And this portrait tallies with what I have
heard of her character. You no doubt observed the face,
Monsieur, — that of a true aristocrat. But I was speaking of her
character. When she was twelve, she said something to a cardinal
for which her mother made her keep her room a whole day. For
Mademoiselle would not retract, and, pardieu, I believe his
Eminence was wrong. The Marquise is afraid of her. And when first
Hélène was presented formally she made such a witty retort to the
Queen’s sally that her Majesty insisted upon her coming to court.
On every New Year’s day I have always sent a present of coffee and
perique to my cousin the Marquis, and it is Mademoiselle who
writes to thank us. Parole d’honneur, her letters make me see
again the people amongst whom she moves, — the dukes and duchesses,
the cardinals, bishops, and generals. She draws them to the life,
Monsieur, with a touch that makes them all ridiculous. His Majesty
does not escape. God forgive him, he is indeed an amiable, weak
person for calling a States General. And the Queen, a frivolous
lady, but true to those whom she loves, and beginning now to
realize the perils of the situation.” He paused. "Is it any wonder
that Auguste has fallen in love with his cousin, Monsieur? That he
loses his head, forgets that he is a gentleman, and steals her
portrait from his sister!”
Had I not been so occupied with my own fate in the outcome of
this inquisition, I should have been sorry for Auguste. And yet
this feeling could not have lasted, for the young gentleman sprang
to his feet, cast a glance at me which was not without malignance,
and faced his father, his lips twitching with anger and fear.
Monsieur de St. Gré sat undisturbed.
“He is so much in love with the portrait, Monsieur, that he
loses it.”
“Loses it!” cried Auguste.
“Precisely,” said his father, dryly, “for Mr. Ritchie tells me
he found it — at Madame Bouvet’s, was it not, Monsieur?”
Auguste looked at me.
“Mille diables!” he said, and sat down again heavily.
“Mr. Ritchie has returned it to your sister, a service which
puts him heavily in our debt,” said Monsieur de St. Gré. "Now,
sir,” he added to me, rising, “you have had a tiresome day. I will
show you to your room, and in the morning we will begin
our — investigations.”
He clapped his hands, the silent mulatto appeared with a new
candle, and I followed my host down the gallery to a room which he
flung open at the far end. A great four-poster bedstead was in one
corner, and a polished mahogany dresser in the other.
“We have saved some of our family furniture from the fire, Mr.
Ritchie,” said Monsieur de St. Gré; "that bed was brought from
Paris by my father forty years ago. I hope you will rest well.”
He set the candle on the table, and as he bowed there was a
trace of an enigmatical smile about his mouth. How much he knew of
Auguste’s transaction I could not fathom, but the matter and the
scarcely creditable part I had played in it kept me awake far into
the night. I was just falling into a troubled sleep when a
footstep on the gallery startled me back to consciousness. It was
followed by a light tap on the door.
“Monsieur Reetchie,” said a voice.
It was Monsieur Auguste. He was not an imposing figure in his
nightrail, and by the light of the carefully shaded candle he held
in his hand I saw that he had hitherto deceived me in the matter
of his calves. He stood peering at me as I lay under the mosquito
bar.
“How is it I can thank you, Monsieur!” he exclaimed in a
whisper.
“By saying nothing, Monsieur,” I answered.
“You are noble, you are generous, and — and one day I will give
you the money back,” he added with a burst of magniloquence. "You
have behave very well, Monsieur, and I mek you my friend. Behol’
Auguste de St. Gré, entirely at your service, Monsieur.” He made a sweeping bow that might have been impressive save for the
nightrail, and sought my hand, which he grasped in a fold of the
mosquito bar.
“I am overcome, Monsieur,” I said.
“Monsieur Reetchie, you are my friend, my intimate" (he put an
aspirate on the word). “I go to tell you one leetle secret. I find
that I can repose confidence in you. My father does not understan’
me, you saw, Monsieur, he does not appreciate — that is the
Engleesh. Mon Dieu, you saw it this night. I, who spik to you, am
made for a courtier, a noble. I have the gift. La Louisiane — she is
not so big enough for me.” He lowered his voice still further, and
bent nearer to me. "Monsieur, I run away to France. My cousin the
Marquis will help me. You will hear of Auguste de St. Gré at
Versailles, at Trianon, at Chantilly, and peut-être — ”
“It is a worthy campaign, Monsieur,” I interrupted.
A distant sound broke the stillness, and Auguste was near to
dropping the candle on me.
“Adieu, Monsieur,” he whispered; “milles tonneres, I have done
one extraordinaire foolish thing when I am come to this house
to-night.”
And he disappeared, shading his candle, as he had come.
DURING THE next two days I had more evidence of Monsieur de St.
Gre’s ability, and, thanks to his conduct of my campaign, not the
least suspicion of my mission to New Orleans got abroad. Certain
gentlemen were asked to dine, we called on others, and met still
others casually in their haunts of business or pleasure. I was
troubled because of the inconvenience and discomfort to which my
host put himself, for New Orleans in the dog-days may be likened
in climate to the under side of the lid of a steam kettle. But at
length, on the second evening, after we had supped on jambalaya
and rice cakes and other dainties, and the last guest had gone, my
host turned to me.
“The rest of the burrow is the same, Mr. Ritchie, until it comes
to the light again.”
“And the fox has crawled out of the other end,” I said.
“Precisely,” he answered, laughing; “in short, if you were to
remain in New Orleans until New Year’s, you would not learn a whit
more. To-morrow morning I have a little business of my own to
transact, and we shall get to Les Iles in time for dinner. No,
don’t thank me,” he protested; “there’s a certain rough honesty
and earnestness ingrained in you which I like. And besides,” he
added, smiling, “you are poor indeed at thanking, Mr. Ritchie. You
could never do it gracefully. But if ever I were in trouble, I
believe that I might safely call on you.”
The next day was a rare one, for a wind from somewhere had blown
the moisture away a little, the shadows were clearer cut, and by
noon Monsieur de St. Gré and I were walking our horses in the
shady road behind the levee. We were followed at a respectful
distance by Andreacute;, Monsieur’s mulatto body-servant, and as we rode
my companion gave me stories of the owners of the different
plantations we passed, and spoke of many events of interest in the
history of the colony. Presently he ceased to talk, and rode in
silence for many minutes. And then he turned upon me suddenly.
“Mr. Ritchie,” he said, “you have seen my son. It may be that in
him I am paying the price of my sins. I have done everything to
set him straight, but in vain. Monsieur, every son of the St.
Gre’s has awakened sooner or later to a sense of what becomes him.
But Auguste is a fool,” he cried bitterly, — a statement which I
could not deny; "were it not for my daughter, Antoinette, I should
be a miserable man indeed.”
Inasmuch as he was not a person of confidences, I felt the more
flattered that he should speak so plainly to me, and I had a great
sympathy for this strong man who could not help himself.
“You have observed Antoinette, Mr. Ritchie,” he continued; "she
is a strange mixture of wilfulness and caprice and self-sacrifice,
and she has at times a bit of that wit which has made our house
for generations the intimates — I may say — of sovereigns.”
This peculiar pride of race would have amused me in another man.
I found myself listening to Monsieur de St. Gré with gravity, and
I did not dare to reply that I had had evidence of Mademoiselle’s
aptness of retort.
“She has been my companion since she was a child, Monsieur. She
has disobeyed me, flaunted me, nursed me in illness, championed me
behind my back. I have a little book which I have kept of her
sayings and doings, which may interest you, Monsieur. I will show
it you.”
This indeed was a new side of Monsieur de St. Gré, and I
reflected rather ruefully upon the unvarnished truth of what Mr.
Wharton had told me, — ay, and what Colonel Clark had emphasized
long before. It was my fate never to be treated as a young man. It
struck me that Monsieur de St. Gré had never even considered me in
the light of a possible suitor for his daughter’s hand.
“I should be delighted to see them, Monsieur,” I answered.
“Would you?” he exclaimed, his face lighting up as he glanced at
me. "Alas, Madame de St. Gré and I have promised to go to our
neighbors’, Monsieur and Madame Bertrand’s, for to-night. But,
to-morrow, if you have leisure, we shall look at it together. And
not a word of this to my daughter, Monsieur,” he added
apprehensively; "she would never forgive me. She dislikes my
talking of her, but at times I cannot help it. It was only last
year that she was very angry with me, and would not speak to me
for days, because I boasted of her having watched at the bedside
of a poor gentleman who came here and got the fever. You will not
tell her?”
“Indeed I shall not, Monsieur,” I answered.
“It is strange,” he said abruptly, “it is strange that this
gentleman and his wife should likewise have had letters to us from
Monsieur Gratiot. They came from St. Louis, and they were on their
way to Paris.”
“To Paris?” I cried; "what was their name?”
He looked at me in surprise.
“Clive,” he said.
“Clive!” I cried, leaning towards him in my saddle. "Clive! And
what became of them?”
This time he gave me one of his searching looks, and it was not
unmixed with astonishment.
“Why do you ask. Monsieur?” he demanded. "Did you know them?”
I must have shown that I was strangely agitated. For the moment
I could not answer.
“Monsieur Gratiot himself spoke of them to me,” I said, after a
little; "he said they were an interesting couple.”
“Pardieu!” exclaimed Monsieur de St. Gré, “he put it mildly.” He
gave me another look. "There was something about them, Monsieur,
which I could not fathom. Why were they drifting? They were people
of quality who had seen the world, who were by no means paupers,
who had no cause to travel save a certain restlessness. And while
they were awaiting the sailing of the packet for France they came
to our house — the old one in the Rue Bourbon that was burned. I
would not speak ill of the dead, but Mr. Clive I did not like. He
fell sick of the fever in my house, and it was there that
Antoinette and Madame de St. Gré took turns with his wife in
watching at his bedside. I could do nothing with Antoinette,
Monsieur, and she would not listen to my entreaties, my prayers,
my commands. We buried the poor fellow in the alien ground, for he
did not die in the Church, and after that my daughter clung to
Mrs. Clive. She would not let her go, and the packet sailed
without her. I have never seen such affection. I may say,” he
added quickly, “that Madame de St. Gré and I share in it, for Mrs.
Clive is a lovable woman and a strong character. And into the
great sorrow that lies behind her life, we have never probed.”
“And she is with you now, Monsieur?” I asked.
“She lives with us, Monsieur,” he answered simply, “and I hope
for always. No,” he said quickly, “it is not charity, — she has
something of her own. We love her, and she is the best of
companions for my daughter. For the rest, Monsieur, she seems
benumbed, with no desire to go back or to go farther.”
An entrance drive to the plantation of Les Îles, unknown to Nick
and me, led off from the main road like a green tunnel arched out
of the forest. My feelings as we entered this may be imagined, for
I was suddenly confronted with the situation which I had dreaded
since my meeting with Nick at Jonesboro. I could scarcely allow
myself even the faint hope that Mrs. Clive might not prove to be
Mrs. Temple after all. Whilst I was in this agony of doubt and
indecision, the drive suddenly came out on a shaded lawn dotted
with flowering bushes. There was the house with its gallery, its
curved dormer roof and its belvedere; and a white, girlish figure
flitted down the steps. It was Mademoiselle Antoinette, and no
sooner had her father dismounted than she threw herself into his
arms. Forgetful of my presence, he stood murmuring in her ear like
a lover; and as I watched them my trouble slipped from my mind,
and gave place to a vaguer regret that I had been a wanderer
throughout my life. Presently she turned up to him a face on which
was written something which he could not understand. His own
stronger features reflected a vague disquiet.
“What is it, ma chérie?”
What was it indeed? Something was in her eyes which bore a
message and presentiment to me. She dropped them, fastening in the
lapel of his coat a flaunting red flower set against a shining
leaf, and there was a gentle, joyous subterfuge in her answer.
“Thou pardoned Auguste, as I commanded?” she said. They were
speaking in the familiar French.
“Ha, diable! is it that which disquiets thee?” said her father.
"We will not speak of Auguste. Dost thou know Monsieur Ritchie,
’Toinette?”
She disengaged herself and dropped me a courtesy, her eyes
seeking the ground. But she said not a word. At that instant
Madame de St. Gré herself appeared on the gallery, followed by
Nick, who came down the steps with a careless self-confidence to
greet the master. Indeed, a stranger might have thought that Mr.
Temple was the host, and I saw Antoinette watching him furtively
with a gleam of amusement in her eyes.
“I am delighted to see you at last, Monsieur,” said my cousin.
"I am Nicholas Temple, and I have been your guest for three days.”
Had Monsieur de St. Gré been other than the soul of hospitality,
it would have been impossible not to welcome such a guest. Our
host had, in common with his daughter, a sense of humor. There was
a quizzical expression on his fine face as he replied, with the
barest glance at Mademoiselle Antoinette: —
“I trust you have been — well entertained, Mr. Temple. My daughter
has been accustomed only to the society of her brother and
cousins.”
“Faith, I should not have supposed it,” said Nick, instantly, a
remark which caused the color to flush deeply into Mademoiselle’s
face. I looked to see Monsieur de St. Gré angry. He tried, indeed,
to be grave, but smiled irresistibly as he mounted the steps to
greet his wife, who stood demurely awaiting his caress. And in
this interval Mademoiselle shot at Nick a swift and withering look
as she passed him. He returned a grimace.
“Messieurs,” said Monsieur de St. Gré, turning to us, “dinner
will soon be ready — if you will be so good as to pardon me until
then.”
Nick followed Mademoiselle with his eyes until she had
disappeared beyond the hall. She did not so much as turn. Then he
took me by the arm and led me to a bench under a magnolia a little
distance away, where he seated himself, and looked up at me
despairingly.
“Behold,” said he, “what was once your friend and cousin, your
counsellor, sage, and guardian. Behold the clay which conducted
you hither, with the heart neatly but painfully extracted. Look
upon a woman’s work, Davy, and shun the sex. I tell you it is
better to go blindfold through life, to have — pardon me — your own
blunt features, than to be reduced to such a pitiable state. Was
ever such a refinement of cruelty practised before? Never! Was
there ever such beauty, such archness, such coquetry, — such damned
elusiveness? Never! If there is a cargo going up the river, let me
be salted and lie at the bottom of it. I’ll warrant you I’ll not
come to life.”
“You appear to have suffered somewhat,” I said, forgetting for
the moment in my laughter the thing that weighed upon my mind.
“Suffered!” he cried; "I have been tossed high in the azure that
I might sink the farther into the depths. I have been put in a
grave, the earth stamped down, resurrected, and flung into the
dust-heap. I have been taken up to the gate of heaven and dropped
a hundred and fifty years through darkness. Since I have seen you
I have been the round of all the bright places and all the
bottomless pits in the firmament.”
“It seems to have made you literary,” I remarked judicially.
“I burn up twenty times a day,” he continued, with a wave of the
hand to express the completeness of the process; "there is nothing
left. I see her, I speak to her, and I burn up.”
“Have you had many tête-à-têtes?” I asked.
“Not one,” he retorted fiercely; "do you think there is any
sense in the damnable French custom? I am an honorable man, and,
besides, I am not equipped for an elopement. No priest in
Louisiana would marry us. I see her at dinner, at supper.
Sometimes we sew on the gallery,” he went on, “but I give you my
oath that I have not had one word with her alone.”
“An oath is not necessary,” I said. "But you seem to have made
some progress nevertheless.”
“Do you call that progress?” he demanded.
“It is surely not retrogression.”
“God knows what it is,” said Nick, helplessly, “but it’s got to
stop. I have sent her an ultimatum.”
“A what?”
“A summons. Her father and mother are going to the Bertrands’
to-night, and I have written her a note to meet me in the garden.
And you,” he cried, rising and slapping me between the shoulders,
"you are to keep watch, like the dear, careful, canny, sly rascal
you are.”
“And — and has she accepted?” I inquired.
“That’s the deuce of it,” said he; "she has not. But I think
she’ll come.”
I stood for a moment regarding him.
“And you really love Mademoiselle Antoinette?” I asked.
“Have I not exhausted the language?” he answered. "If what I
have been through is not love, then may the Lord shield me from
the real disease.”
“It may have been merely a light case of — tropical enthusiasm,
let us say. I have seen others, a little milder because the air
was more temperate.”
“Tropical — balderdash,” he exploded. "If you are not the most
exasperating, unfeeling man alive — "
“I merely wanted to know if you wished to marry Mademoiselle de
St. Gré,” I interrupted.
He gave me a look of infinite tolerance.
“Have I not made it plain that I cannot live without her?” he
said; "if not, I will go over it all again.”
“That will not be necessary,” I said hastily.
“The trouble may be,” he continued, “that they have already made
one of their matrimonial contracts with a Granpre, a Beausejour, a
Bernard.”
“Monsieur de St. Gré is a very sensible man,” I answered. "He
loves his daughter, and I doubt if he would force her to marry
against her will. Tell me, Nick,” I asked, laying my hand upon his
shoulder, “do you love this girl so much that you would let
nothing come between you and her?”
“I tell you, I do; and again I tell you, I do,” he replied. He
paused, suddenly glancing at my face, and added, “Why do you ask,
Davy?”
I stood irresolute, now that the time had come not daring to
give voice to my suspicions. He had not spoken to me of his mother
save that once, and I had no means of knowing whether his feeling
for the girl might not soften his anger against her. I have never
lacked the courage to come to the point, but there was still the
chance that I might be mistaken in this after all. Would it not be
best to wait until I had ascertained in some way the identity of
Mrs. Clive? And while I stood debating, Nick regarding me with a
puzzled expression, Monsieur de St. Gré appeared on the gallery.
“Come, gentlemen,” he cried; "dinner awaits us.”
The dining room at Les Iles was at the corner of the house, and
its windows looked out on the gallery, which was shaded at that
place by dense foliage. The room, like others in the house, seemed
to reflect the decorous character of its owner. Two St. Gré’s,
indifferently painted, but rigorous and respectable, relieved the
whiteness of the wall. They were the Commissary-general and his
wife. The lattices were closed on one side, and in the deep amber
light the family silver shone but dimly. The dignity of our host,
the evident ceremony of the meal, — which was attended by three
servants, — would have awed into a modified silence at least a less
irrepressible person than Nicholas Temple. But Nick was one to
carry by storm a position which another might wait to reconnoitre.
The first sensation of our host was no doubt astonishment, but he
was soon laughing over a vivid account of our adventures on the
keel boat. Nick’s imitation of Xavier, and his description of
Benjy’s terrors after the storm, were so perfect that I laughed
quite as heartily; and Madame de St. Gré wiped her eyes and
repeated continually, “Quel drôle monsieur! it is thus he has
entertained us since thou departed, Philippe.”
As for Mademoiselle, I began to think that Nick was not far
wrong in his diagnosis. Training may have had something to do with
it. She would not laugh, not she, but once or twice she raised her
napkin to her face and coughed slightly. For the rest, she sat
demurely, with her eyes on her plate, a model of propriety. Nick’s
sufferings became more comprehensible.
To give the devil his due, Nick had an innate tact which told
him when to stop, and perhaps at this time Mademoiselle’s
superciliousness made him subside the more quickly. After Monsieur
de St. Gré had explained to me the horrors of the indigo pest and
the futility of sugar raising, he turned to his daughter.
“’Toinette, where is Madame Clive?” he asked. The girl looked
up, startled into life and interest at once.
“Oh, papa,” she cried in French, “we are so worried about her,
mamma and I. It was the day you went away, the day these gentlemen
came, that we thought she would take an airing. And suddenly she
became worse.”
Monsieur de St. Gré turned with concern to his wife.
“I do not know what it is, Philippe,” said that lady; "it seems
to be mental. The loss of her husband weighs upon her, poor lady.
But this is worse than ever, and she will lie for hours with her
face turned to the wall, and not even Antoinette can arouse her.”
“I have always been able to comfort her before,” said
Antoinette, with a catch in her voice.
I took little account of what was said after that, my only
notion being to think the problem out for myself, and alone. As I
was going to my room Nick stopped me.
“Come into the garden, Davy,” he said.
“When I have had my siesta,” I answered.
“When you have had your siesta!” he cried; "since when did you
begin to indulge in siestas?”
“To-day,” I replied, and left him staring after me.
I reached my room, bolted the door, and lay down on my back to
think. Little was needed to convince me now that Mrs. Clive was
Mrs. Temple, and thus the lady’s relapse when she heard that her
son was in the house was accounted for. Instead of forming a plan,
my thoughts drifted from that into pity for her, and my memory ran
back many years to the text of good Mr. Mason’s sermon, “I have
refined thee, but not with silver, I have chosen thee in the
furnace of affliction.” What must Sarah Temple have suffered since
those days! I remembered her in her prime, in her beauty, in her
selfishness, in her cruelty to those whom she might have helped,
and I wondered the more at the change which must have come over
the woman that she had won the affections of this family, that she
had gained the untiring devotion of Mademoiselle Antoinette. Her
wit might not account for it, for that had been cruel. And
something of the agony of the woman’s soul as she lay in torment,
facing the wall, thinking of her son under the same roof, of a
life misspent and irrevocable, I pictured.
A stillness crept into the afternoon like the stillness of
night. The wide house was darkened and silent, and without a
sunlight washed with gold filtered through the leaves. There was a
drowsy hum of bees, and in the distance the occasional languishing
note of a bird singing what must have been a cradle-song. My mind
wandered, and shirked the task that was set to it.
Could anything be gained by meddling? I had begun to convince
myself that nothing could, when suddenly I came face to face with
the consequences of a possible marriage between Nick and
Mademoiselle Antoinette. In that event the disclosure of his
mother’s identity would be inevitable. Not only his happiness was
involved, but Mademoiselle’s, her father’s and her mother’s, and
lastly that of this poor hunted woman herself, who thought at last
to have found a refuge.
An hour passed, and it became more and more evident to me that I
must see and talk with Mrs. Temple. But how was I to communicate
with her? At last I took out my portfolio and wrote these words on
a sheet: —
“If Mrs. Clive will consent to a meeting with Mr. David Ritchie,
he will deem it a favor. Mr. Ritchie assures Mrs. Clive that he
makes this request in all friendliness.”
I lighted a candle, folded the note and sealed it, addressed it
to Mrs. Clive, and opening the latticed door I stepped out.
Walking along the gallery until I came to the rear part of the
house which faced towards the out-buildings, I spied three figures
prone on the grass under a pecan tree that shaded the kitchen
roof. One of these figures was Benjy, and he was taking his
siesta. I descended quietly from the gallery, and making my way to
him, touched him on the shoulder. He awoke and stared at me with
white eyes.
“Marse Dave!” he cried.
“Hush,” I answered, “and follow me.”
He came after me, wondering, a little way into the grove, where
I stopped.
“Benjy,” I said, “do you know any of the servants here?”
“Lawsy, Marse Dave, I reckon I knows ’em, — some of ’em,” he
answered with a grin.
“You talk to them?”
“Shucks, no, Marse Dave,” he replied with a fine scorn, “I ain’t
no hand at dat ar nigger French. But I knows some on ’em, and
right well too.”
“How?” I demanded curiously.
Benjy looked down sheepishly at his feet. He was standing
pigeon-toed.
“I done c’ressed some on ’em, Marse Dave,” he said at length,
and there was a note of triumph in his voice.
“You did what?” I asked.
“I done kissed one of dem yaller gals, Marse Dave. Yass’r, I
done kissed M’lisse.”
“Do you think Melisse would do something for you if you asked
her?” I inquired.
Benjy seemed hurt.
“Marse Dave — " he began reproachfully.
“Very well, then,” I interrupted, taking the letter from my
pocket, “there is a lady who is ill here, Mrs. Clive — "
I paused, for a new look had come into Benjy’s eyes. He began
that peculiar, sympathetic laugh of the negro, which catches and
doubles on itself, and I imagined that a new admiration for me
dawned on his face.
“Yass’r, yass, Marse Dave, I reckon M’lisse ’ll git it to her
’thout any one tekin’ notice.”
I bit my lips.
“If Mrs. Clive receives this within an hour, Melisse shall have
one piastre, and you another. There is an answer.”
Benjy took the note, and departed nimbly to find Melisse, while
I paced up and down in my uneasiness as to the outcome of the
experiment. A quarter of an hour passed, half an hour, and then I
saw Benjy coming through the trees. He stood before me, chuckling,
and drew from his pocket a folded piece of paper. I gave him the
two piastres, warned him if his master or any one inquired for me
that I was taking a walk, and bade him begone. Then I opened the
note.
“I will meet you at the bayou, at seven this evening. Take the
path that leads through the garden.”
I read it with a catch of the breath, with a certainty that the
happiness of many people depended upon what I should say at that
meeting. And to think of this and to compose myself a little, I
made my way to the garden in search of the path, that I might know
it when the time came. Entering a gap in the hedge, I caught sight
of the shaded seat under the tree which had been the scene of our
first meeting with Antoinette, and I hurried past it as I crossed
the garden. There were two openings in the opposite hedge, the one
through which Nick and I had come, and another. I took the second,
and with little difficulty found the path of which the note had
spoken. It led through a dense, semi-tropical forest in the
direction of the swamp beyond, the way being well beaten, but here
and there jealously crowded by an undergrowth of brambles and the
prickly Spanish bayonet. I know not how far I had walked, my head
bent in thought, before I felt the ground teetering under my feet,
and there was the bayou. It was a narrow lane of murky,
impenetrable water, shaded now by the forest wall. Imaged on its
amber surface were the twisted boughs of the cypresses of the
swamp beyond, — boughs funereally draped, as though to proclaim a
warning of unknown perils in the dark places. On that side where I
stood ancient oaks thrust their gnarled roots into the water, and
these knees were bridged by treacherous platforms of moss. As I
sought for a safe resting-place a dull splash startled me, the
pink-and-white water lilies danced on the ripples, and a long,
black snout pushed its way to the centre of the bayou and floated
there motionless.
I sat down on a wide knee that seemed to be fashioned for the
purpose, and reflected. It may have been about half-past five, and
I made up my mind that, rather than return and risk explanations,
I would wait where I was until Mrs. Temple appeared. I had much to
think of, and for the rest the weird beauty of the place, with its
changing colors as the sun fell, held me in fascination. When the
blue vapor stole through the cypress swamp, my trained ear caught
the faintest of warning sounds. Mrs. Temple was coming.
I could not repress the exclamation that rose to my lips when
she stood before me.
“I have changed somewhat,” she began quite calmly; "I have
changed since you were at Temple Bow.”
I stood staring at her, at a loss to know whether by these words
she sought to gain an advantage. I knew not whether to pity or to
be angry, such a strange blending she seemed of former pride and
arrogance and later suffering. There were the features of the
beauty still, the eyes defiant, the lips scornful. Sorrow had set
its brand upon this protesting face in deep, violet marks under
the eyes, in lines which no human power could erase: sorrow had
flecked with white the gold of the hair, had proclaimed her a
woman with a history. For she had a new and remarkable beauty
which puzzled and astonished me, — a beauty in which maternity had
no place. The figure, gowned with an innate taste in black, still
kept the rounded lines of the young woman, while about the
shoulders and across the open throat a lace mantilla was thrown.
She stood facing me, undaunted, and I knew that she had come to
fight for what was left her. I knew further that she was no mean
antagonist.
“Will you kindly tell me to what circumstance I owe the honor of
this — summons, Mr. Ritchie?” she asked. "You are a travelled person
for one so young. I might almost say,” she added with an
indifferent laugh, “that there is some method and purpose in your
travels.”
“Indeed, you do me wrong, Madame,” I replied; "I am here by the
merest chance.”
Again she laughed lightly, and stepping past me took her seat on
the oak from which I had risen. I marvelled that this woman, with
all her self-possession, could be the same as she who had held her
room, cowering, these four days past. Admiration for her courage
mingled with my other feelings, and for the life of me I knew not
where to begin. My experience with women of the world was, after
all, distinctly limited. Mrs. Temple knew, apparently by
intuition, the advantage she had gained, and she smiled.
“The Ritchies were always skilled in dealing with sinners,” she
began; "the first earl had the habit of hunting them like foxes,
so it is said. I take it for granted that, before my sentence is
pronounced, I shall have the pleasure of hearing my wrong-doings
in detail. I could not ask you to forego that satisfaction.”
“You seem to know the characteristics of my family, Mrs.
Temple,” I answered. "There is one trait of the Ritchies
concerning which I ask your honest opinion.”
“And what is that?” she said carelessly.
“I have always understood that they have spoken the truth. Is it
not so?”
She glanced at me curiously.
“I never knew your father to lie,” she answered; "but after all
he had few chances. He so seldom spoke.”
“Your intercourse with me at Temple Bow was quite as limited,” I
said.
“Ah,” she interrupted quickly, “you bear me that grudge. It is
another trait of the Ritchies.”
“I bear you no grudge, Madame,” I replied. "I asked you a
question concerning the veracity of my family, and I beg that you
will believe what I say.”
“And what is this momentous statement?” she asked.
I had hard work to keep my temper, but I knew that I must not
lose it.
“I declare to you on my honor that my business in New Orleans in
no way concerns you, and that I had not the slightest notion of
finding you here. Will you believe that?”
“And what then?” she asked.
“I also declare to you that, since meeting your son, my chief
anxiety has been lest he should run across you.”
“You are very considerate of others,” she said. "Let us admit
for the sake of argument that you come here by accident.”
It was the opening I had sought for, but despaired of getting.
“Then put yourself for a moment in my place, Madame, and give me
credit for a little kindliness of feeling, and a sincere affection
for your son.”
There was a new expression on her face, and the light of a
supreme effort in her eyes.
“I give you credit at least for a logical mind,” she answered.
"In spite of myself you have put me at the bar and seem to be
conducting my trial.”
“I do not see why there should be any rancor between us,” I
answered. "It is true that I hated you at Temple Bow. When my
father was killed and I was left a homeless orphan you had no pity
for me, though your husband was my mother’s brother. But you did
me a good turn after all, for you drove me out into a world where
I learned to rely upon myself. Furthermore, it was not in your
nature to treat me well.”
“Not in my nature?” she repeated.
“You were seeking happiness, as every one must in their own way.
That happiness lay, apparently, with Mr. Riddle.”
“Ah,” she cried, with a catch of her breath, “I thought you
would be judging me.”
“I am stating facts. Your son was a sufficient embarrassment in
this matter, and I should have been an additional one. I blame you
not, Mrs. Temple, for anything you have done to me, but I blame
you for embittering Nick’s life.”
“And he?” she said. It seemed to me that I detected a faltering
in her voice.
“I will hide nothing from you. He blames you, with what justice
I leave you to decide.”
She did not answer this, but turned her head away towards the
bayou. Nor could I determine what was in her mind.
“And now I ask you whether I have acted as your friend in
begging you to meet me.”
She turned to me swiftly at that.
“I am at a loss to see how there can be friendship between us,
Mr. Ritchie,” she said.
“Very good then, Madame; I am sorry,” I answered. "I have done
all that is in my power, and now events will have to take their
course.”
I had not gone two steps into the wood before I heard her voice
calling my name. She had risen, and leaned with her hand against
the oak.
“Does Nick — know that you are here?” she cried.
“No,” I answered shortly. Then I realized suddenly what I had
failed to grasp before, — she feared that I would pity her.
“David!”
I started violently at the sound of my name, at the new note in
her voice, at the change in the woman as I turned. And then before
I realized what she had done she had come to me swiftly and laid
her hand upon my arm.
“David, does he hate me?”
All the hope remaining in her life was in that question, was in
her face as she searched mine with a terrible scrutiny. And never
had I known such an ordeal. It seemed as if I could not answer,
and as I stood staring back at her a smile was forced to her lips.
“I will pay you one tribute, my friend,” she said; "you are
honest.”
But even as she spoke I saw her sway, and though I could not be
sure it were not a dizziness in me, I caught her. I shall always
marvel at the courage there was in her, for she straightened and
drew away from me a little proudly, albeit gently, and sat down on
the knee of the oak, looking across the bayou towards the mist of
the swamp. There was the infinite calmness of resignation in her
next speech.
“Tell me about him,” she said.
She was changed indeed. Were it not so I should have heard of
her own sufferings, of her poor, hunted life from place to place,
of countless nights made sleepless by the past. Pride indeed was
left, but the fire had burned away the last vestige of
selfishness.
I sat down beside her, knowing full well that I should be judged
by what I said. She listened, motionless, though something of what
that narrative cost her I knew by the current of sympathy that ran
now between us. Unmarked, the day faded, a new light was spread
over the waters, the mist was spangled with silver points, the
Spanish moss took on the whiteness of lace against the black
forest swamp, and on the yellow face of the moon the star-shaped
leaves of a gum were printed.
At length I paused. She neither spoke, nor moved — save for the
rising and falling of her shoulders. The hardest thing I had to
say I saved for the last, and I was near lacking the courage to
continue.
“There is Mademoiselle Antoinette — " I began, and stopped, — she
turned on me so quickly and laid a hand on mine.
“Nick loves her!” she cried.
“You know it!” I exclaimed, wondering.
“Ah, David,” she answered brokenly, “I foresaw it from the
first. I, too, love the girl. No human being has ever given me
such care and such affection. She — she is all that I have left.
Must I give her up? Have I not paid the price of my sins?”
I did not answer, knowing that she saw the full cruelty of the
predicament. What happiness remained to her now of a battered life
stood squarely in the way of her son’s happiness. That was the
issue, and no advice or aid of mine could change it. There was
another silence that seemed to me an eternity as I watched, a
helpless witness, the struggle going on within her. At last she
got to her feet, her face turned to the shadow.
“I will go, David,” she said. Her voice was low and she spoke
with a steadiness that alarmed me. "I will go.”
Torn with pity, I thought again, but I could see no alternative.
And then, suddenly, she was clinging to me, her courage gone, her
breast shaken with sobs. "Where shall I go?” she cried. "God help
me! Are there no remote places where He will not seek me out? I
have tried them all, David.” And quite as suddenly she disengaged
herself, and looked at me strangely. "You are well revenged for
Temple Bow,” she said.
“Hush,” I answered, and held her, fearing I knew not what, “you
have not lacked courage. It is not so bad as you believe. I will
devise a plan and help you. Have you money?”
“Yes,” she answered, with a remnant of her former pride; "and I
have an annuity paid now to Mr. Clark.”
“Then listen to what I say,” I answered. "To-night I will take
you to New Orleans and hide you safely. And I swear to you,
whether it be right or wrong, that I will use every endeavor to
change Nick’s feelings towards you. Come,” I continued, leading
her gently into the path, “let us go while there is yet time.”
“Stop,” she said, and I halted fearfully. "David Ritchie, you
are a good man. I can make no amends to you,” — she did not finish.
Feeling for the path in the blackness of the wood, I led her by
the hand, and she followed me as trustfully as a child. At last,
after an age of groping, the heavy scents of shrubs and flowers
stole to us on the night air, and we came out at the hedge into
what seemed a blaze of light that flooded the rows of color. Here
we paused, breathless, and looked. The bench under the great tree
was vacant, and the garden was empty.
It was she who led the way through the hedge, who halted in the
garden path at the sound of voices. She turned, but there was no
time to flee, for the tall figure of a man came through the
opposite hedge, followed by a lady. One was Nicholas Temple, the
other, Mademoiselle de St. Gré. Mrs. Temple’s face alone was in
the shadow, and as I felt her hand trembling on my arm I summoned
all my resources. It was Nick who spoke first.
“It is Davy!” he cried. "Oh, the sly rascal! And this is the
promenade of which he left us word, the solitary meditation! Speak
up, man; you are forgiven for deserting us.”
He turned, laughing, to Mademoiselle. But she stood with her
lips parted and her hands dropped, staring at my companion. Then
she took two steps forward and stopped with a cry.
“Mrs. Clive!”
The woman beside me turned, and with a supreme courage raised
her head and faced the girl.
“Yes, Antoinette, it is I,” she answered.
And then my eyes sought Nick, for Mrs. Temple had faced her son
with a movement that was a challenge, yet with a look that
questioned, yearned, appealed. He, too, stared, the laughter
fading from his eyes, first astonishment, and then anger, growing
in them, slowly, surely. I shall never forget him as he stood
there (for what seemed an age) recalling one by one the wrongs
this woman had done him. She herself had taught him to brook no
restraint, to follow impetuously his loves and hates, and
endurance in these things was moulded in every line of his finely
cut features. And when he spoke it was not to her, but to the girl
at his side.
“Do you know who this is?” he said. "Tell me, do you know this
woman?”
Mademoiselle de St. Gré did not answer him. She drew near,
gently, to Mrs. Temple, whose head was bowed, whose agony I could
only guess.
“Mrs. Clive,” she said softly, though her voice was shaken by a
prescience, “won’t you tell me what has happened? Won’t you speak
to me — Antoinette?”
The poor lady lifted up her arms, as though to embrace the girl,
dropped them despairingly, and turned away.
“Antoinette,” she murmured, “Antoinette!”
For Nick had seized Antoinette by the hand, restraining her.
“You do not know what you are doing?” he cried angrily.
"Listen!”
I had stood bereft of speech, watching the scene breathlessly.
And now I would have spoken had not Mademoiselle astonished me by
taking the lead. I have thought since that I might have pieced
together this much of her character. Her glance at Nick surprised
him momentarily into silence.
“I know that she is my dearest friend,” she said, “that she came
to us in misfortune, and that we love her and trust her. I do not
know why she is here with Mr. Ritchie, but I am sure it is for
some good reason.” She laid a hand on Mrs. Temple’s shoulder.
"Mrs. Clive, won’t you speak to me?”
“My God, Antoinette, listen!” cried Nick; "Mrs. Clive is not her
name. I know her, David knows her. She is an — adventuress!”
Mrs. Temple gave a cry, and the girl shot at him a frightened,
bewildered glance, in which a new-born love struggled with an
older affection.
“An adventuress!” she repeated, her hand dropping, “oh, I do not
believe it. I cannot believe it.”
“You shall believe it,” said Nick, fiercely. "Her name is not
Clive. Ask David what her name is.”
Antoinette’s lips moved, but she shirked the question. And Nick
seized me roughly.
“Tell her,” he said, “tell her! My God, how can I do it? Tell
her, David.”
For the life of me I could not frame the speech at once, my pity
and a new-found and surprising respect for her making it doubly
hard to pronounce her sentence. Suddenly she raised her head, not
proudly, but with a dignity seemingly conferred by years of sorrow
and of suffering. Her tones were even, bereft of every vestige of
hope.
“Antoinette, I have deceived you, though as God is my witness, I
thought no harm could come of it. I deluded myself into believing
that I had found friends and a refuge at last. I am Mrs. Temple.”
“Mrs. Temple!” The girl repeated the name sorrowfully, but
perplexedly, not grasping its full significance.
“She is my mother,” said Nick, with a bitterness I had not
thought in him, “she is my mother, or I would curse her. For she
has ruined my life and brought shame on a good name.”
He paused, his breath catching for very anger. Mrs. Temple hid
her face in her hands, while the girl shrank back in terror. I
grasped him by the arm.
“Have you no compassion?” I cried. But Mrs. Temple interrupted
me.
“He has the right,” she faltered; "it is my just punishment.”
He tore himself away, and took a step to her.
“Where is Riddle?” he cried. "As God lives, I will kill him
without mercy!”
His mother lifted her head again.
“God has judged him,” she said quietly; "he is beyond your
vengeance — he is dead.” A sob shook her, but she conquered it with
a marvellous courage. "Harry Riddle loved me, he was kind to me,
and he was a better man than John Temple.”
Nick recoiled. The fierceness of his anger seemed to go, leaving
a more dangerous humor.
“Then I have been blessed with parents,” he said.
At that she swayed, but when I would have caught her she
motioned me away and turned to Antoinette. Twice Mrs. Temple tried
to speak.
“I was going away to-night,” she said at length, “and you would
never have seen or heard of me more. My nephew David — Mr.
Ritchie — whom I treated cruelly as a boy, had pity on me. He is a
good man, and he was to have taken me away — I do not attempt to
defend myself, my dear, but I pray that you, who have so much
charity, will some day think a little kindly of one who has sinned
deeply, of one who will love and bless you and yours to her dying
day.”
She faltered, and Nick would have spoken had not Antoinette
herself stayed him with a gesture.
“I wish — my son to know the little there is on my side. It is not
much. Yet God may not spare him the sorrow that brings pity. I — I
loved Harry Riddle as a girl. My father was ruined, and I was
forced into marriage with John Temple for his possessions. He was
selfish, overbearing, cruel — unfaithful. During the years I lived
with him he never once spoke kindly to me. I, too, grew wicked and
selfish and heedless. My head was turned by admiration. Mr. Temple
escaped to England in a man-of-war; he left me without a line of
warning, of farewell. I — I have wandered over the earth, haunted by
remorse, and I knew no moment of peace, of happiness, until you
brought me here and sheltered and loved me. And even here I have
had many sleepless hours. A hundred times I have summoned my
courage to tell you, — I could not. I am justly punished,
Antoinette.” She moved a little, timidly, towards the girl, who
stood motionless, dazed by what she heard. She held out a hand,
appealingly, and dropped it. "Good-by, my dear; God will bless you
for your kindness to an unfortunate outcast.”
She glanced with a kind of terror in her eyes from the girl to
Nick, and what she meant to say concerning their love I know not,
for the flood, held back so long, burst upon her. She wept as I
have never seen a woman weep. And then, before Nick or I knew what
had happened, Antoinette had taken her swiftly in her arms and was
murmuring in her ear: —
“You shall not go. You shall not. You will live with me always.”
Presently the sobs ceased, and Mrs. Temple raised her face,
slowly, wonderingly, as if she had not heard aright. And she tried
gently to push the girl away.
“No, Antoinette,” she said, “I have done you harm enough.”
But the girl clung to her strongly, passionately. "I do not care
what you have done,” she cried, “you are good now. I know that you
are good now. I will not cast you out. I will not.”
I stood looking at them, bewildered and astonished by
Mademoiselle’s loyalty. She seemed to have forgotten Nick, as had
I, and then as I turned to him he came towards them. Almost
roughly he took Antoinette by the arm.
“You do not know what you are saying,” he cried. "Come away,
Antoinette, you do not know what she has done — you cannot realize
what she is.”
Antoinette shrank away from him, still clinging to Mrs. Temple.
There was a fearless directness in her look which might have
warned him.
“She is your mother,” she said quietly.
“My mother!” he repeated; "yes, I will tell you what a mother
she has been to me — "
“Nick!”
It passes my power to write down the pity of that appeal, the
hopelessness of it, the yearning in it. Freeing herself from the
girl, Mrs. Temple took one step towards him, her arms held up. I
had not thought that his hatred of her was deep enough to resist
it. It was Antoinette whose intuition divined this ere he had
turned away.
“You have chosen between me and her,” he said; and before we
could get the poor lady to the seat under the oak, he had left the
garden. In my perturbation I glanced at Antoinette, but there was
no other sign in her face save of tenderness for Mrs. Temple.
Mrs. Temple had mercifully fainted. As I crossed the lawn I saw
two figures in the deep shadow beside the gallery, and I heard
Nick’s voice giving orders to Benjy to pack and saddle. When I
reached the garden again the girl had loosed Mrs. Temple’s gown,
and was bending over her, murmuring in her ear.
Many hours later, when the moon was waning towards the horizon,
fearful of surprise by the coming day, I was riding slowly under
the trees on the road to New Orleans. Beside me, veiled in black,
her head bowed, was Mrs. Temple, and no word had escaped her since
she had withdrawn herself gently from the arms of Antoinette on
the gallery at Les Iles. Nick had gone long before. The hardest
task had been to convince the girl that Mrs. Temple might not
stay. After that Antoinette had busied herself, with a silent
fortitude I had not thought was in her, making ready for the
lady’s departure. I shall never forget her as she stood, a slender
figure of sorrow, looking down at us, the tears glistening on her
cheeks. And I could not resist the impulse to mount the steps once
more.
“You were right, Antoinette,” I whispered; "whatever happens,
you will remember that I am your friend. And I will bring him back
to you if I can.”
She pressed my hand, and turned and went slowly into the house.
WERE these things which follow to my thinking not extraordinary,
I should not write them down here, nor should I have presumed to
skip nearly five years of time. For indeed almost five years had
gone by since the warm summer night when I rode into New Orleans
with Mrs. Temple. And in all that time I had not so much as laid
eyes on my cousin and dearest friend, her son. I searched New
Orleans for him in vain, and learned too late that he had taken
passage on a packet which had dropped down the river the next
morning, bound for Charleston and New York.
I have an instinct that this is not the place to relate in
detail what occurred to me before leaving New Orleans. Suffice it
to say that I made my way back through the swamps, the forests,
the cane-brakes of the Indian country, along the Natchez trail to
Nashville, across the barrens to Harrodstown in Kentucky, where I
spent a week in that cabin which had so long been for me a haven
of refuge. Dear Polly Ann! She hugged me as though I were still
the waif whom she had mothered, and wept over the little presents
which I had brought the children. Harrodstown was changed, new
cabins and new faces met me at every turn, and Tom, more
disgruntled than ever, had gone a-hunting with Mr. Boone far into
the wilderness.
I went back to Louisville to take up once more the struggle for
practice, and I do not intend to charge so much as a page with
what may be called the even tenor of my life. I was not a man to
get into trouble on my own account. Louisville grew amazingly;
white frame houses were built, and even brick ones. And ere
Kentucky became a State, in 1792, I had gone as delegate to more
than one of the Danville Conventions.
Among the nations, as you know, a storm raged, and the great
swells from that conflict threatened to set adrift and wreck the
little republic but newly launched. The noise of the tramping of
great armies across the Old World shook the New, and men in whom
the love of fierce fighting was born were stirred to quarrel among
themselves. The Rights of Man! How many wrongs have been done
under that clause! The Bastille stormed; the Swiss Guard
slaughtered; the Reign of Terror, with its daily procession of
tumbrels through the streets of Paris; the murder of that amiable
and well-meaning gentleman who did his best to atone for the sins
of his ancestors; the fearful months of waiting suffered by his
Queen before she, too, went to her death. Often as I lighted my
candle of an evening in my little room to read of these things so
far away, I would drop my Kentucky Gazette to think of a woman
whose face I remembered, to wonder sadly whether Hélène de St. Gré
were among the lists. In her, I was sure, was personified that
courage for which her order will go down eternally through the
pages of history, and in my darker moments I pictured her standing
beside the guillotine with a smile that haunted me.
The hideous image of that strife was reflected amongst our own
people. Budget after budget was hurried by the winds across the
sea. And swift couriers carried the news over the Blue Wall by the
Wilderness Trail (widened now), and thundered through the little
villages of the Blue Grass country to the Falls. What interest,
you will say, could the pioneer lawyers and storekeepers and
planters have in the French Revolution? The Rights of Man! Down
with kings! General Washington and Mr. Adams and Mr. Hamilton
might sigh for them, but they were not for the free-born pioneers
of the West. Citizen was the proper term now, — Citizen General
Wilkinson when that magnate came to town, resplendent in his
brigadier’s uniform. It was thought that Mr. Wilkinson would plot
less were he in the army under the watchful eye of his superiors.
Little they knew him! Thus the Republic had a reward for
adroitness, for treachery, and treason. But what reward had it for
the lonely, embittered, stricken man whose genius and courage had
gained for it the great Northwest territory? What reward had the
Republic for him who sat brooding in his house above the Falls — for
Citizen General Clark?
In those days you were not a Federalist or a Democrat, you were
an Aristocrat or a Jacobin. The French parties were our parties;
the French issue, our issue. Under the patronage of that saint of
American Jacobinism, Thomas Jefferson, a Jacobin society was
organized in Philadelphia, — special guardians of Liberty. And
flying on the March winds over the mountains the seed fell on the
black soil of Kentucky: Lexington had its Jacobin society,
Danville and Louisville likewise their patrons and protectors of
the Rights of Mankind. Federalists were not guillotined in
Kentucky in the summer of 1793, but I might mention more than one
who was shot.
In spite of the Federalists, Louisville prospered, and
incidentally I prospered in a mild way. Mr. Crede, behind whose
store I still lived, was getting rich, and happened to have an
affair of some importance in Philadelphia. Mr. Wharton was kind
enough to recommend a young lawyer who had the following virtues:
he was neither handsome nor brilliant, and he wore snuff-colored
clothes. Mr. Wharton also did me the honor to say that I was
cautious and painstaking, and had a habit of tiring out my
adversary. Therefore, in the early summer of 1793, I went to
Philadelphia. At that time, travellers embarking on such a journey
were prayed over as though they were going to Tartary. I was
absent from Louisville near a year, and there is a diary of what I
saw and felt and heard on this trip for the omission of which I
will be thanked. The great news of that day which concerns the
world — and incidentally this story — was that Citizen Genet had
landed at Charleston.
Citizen Genet, Ambassador of the great Republic of France to the
little Republic of America, landed at Charleston, acclaimed by
thousands, and lost no time. Scarcely had he left that city ere
American privateers had slipped out of Charleston harbor to prey
upon the commerce of the hated Mistress of the Sea. Was there ever
such a march of triumph as that of the Citizen Ambassador
northward to the capital? Everywhere toasted and feasted, Monsieur
Genet did not neglect the Rights of Man, for without doubt the
United States was to declare war on Britain within a fortnight.
Nay, the Citizen Ambassador would go into the halls of Congress
and declare war himself if that faltering Mr. Washington refused
his duty. Citizen Genet organized his legions as he went along,
and threw tricolored cockades from the windows of his carriage.
And at his glorious entry into Philadelphia (where I afterwards
saw the great man with my own eyes), Mr. Washington and his
Federal-Aristocrats trembled in their boots.
It was late in April, 1794, when I reached Pittsburg on my
homeward journey and took passage down the Ohio with a certain
Captain Wendell of the army, in a Kentucky boat. I had known the
Captain in Louisville, for he had been stationed at Fort Finney,
the army post across the Ohio from that town, and he had come to
Pittsburg with a sergeant to fetch down the river some dozen
recruits. This was a most fortunate circumstance for me, and in
more ways than one. Although the Captain was a gruff and blunt
man, grizzled and weather-beaten, a woman-hater, he could be a
delightful companion when once his confidence was gained; and as
we drifted in the mild spring weather through the long reaches
between the passes he talked of Trenton and Brandywine and
Yorktown. There was more than one bond of sympathy between us, for
he worshipped Washington, detested the French party, and had a
hatred for "filthy Democrats" second to none I have ever
encountered.
We stopped for a few days at Fort Harmar, where the Muskingum
pays its tribute to the Ohio, built by the Federal government to
hold the territory which Clark had won. And leaving that
hospitable place we took up our journey once more in the very
miracle-time of the spring. The sunlight was like amber-crystal,
the tall cottonwoods growing by the water-side flaunted a proud
glory of green, the hills behind them that formed the first great
swells of the sea of the wilderness were clothed in a thousand
sheens and shaded by the purple budding of the oaks and walnuts on
the northern slopes. On the yellow sandbars flocks of geese sat
pluming in the sun, or rose at our approach to cast fleeting
shadows on the water, their HONK-HONKS echoing from the hills.
Here and there a hawk swooped down from the azure to break the
surface and bear off a wriggling fish that gleamed like silver,
and at eventide we would see at the brink an elk or doe, with head
poised, watching us as we drifted. We passed here and there a
lonely cabin, to set my thoughts wandering backwards to my youth,
and here and there in the dimples of the hills little clusters of
white and brown houses, one day to become marts of the Republic.
My joy at coming back at this golden season to a country I loved
was tempered by news I had heard from Captain Wendell, and which I
had discussed with the officers at Fort Harmar. The Captain
himself had broached the subject one cool evening, early in the
journey, as we sat over the fire in our little cabin. He had been
telling me about Brandywine, but suddenly he turned to me with a
kind of fierce gesture that was natural to the man.
“Ritchie,” he said, “you were in the Revolution yourself. You
helped Clark to capture that country,” and he waved his hand
towards the northern shore; "why the devil don’t you tell me about
it?”
“You never asked me,” I answered.
He looked at me curiously.
“Well,” he said, “I ask you now.”
I began lamely enough, but presently my remembrance of the young
man who conquered all obstacles, who compelled all men he met to
follow and obey him, carried me strongly into the narrative. I
remembered him, quiet, self-contained, resourceful, a natural
leader, at twenty-five a bulwark for the sorely harried settlers
of Kentucky; the man whose clear vision alone had perceived the
value of the country north of the Ohio to the Republic, who had
compelled the governor and council of Virginia to see it likewise.
Who had guarded his secret from all men, who in the face of fierce
opposition and intrigue had raised a little army to follow
him — they knew not where. Who had surprised Kaskaskia, cowed the
tribes of the North in his own person, and by sheer force of will
drew after him and kept alive a motley crowd of men across the
floods and through the ice to Vincennes.
We sat far into the night, the Captain listening as I had never
seen a man listen. And when at length I had finished he was for a
long time silent, and then he sprang to his feet with an oath that
woke the sleeping soldiers forward and glared at me.
“My God!” he cried, “it is enough to make a man curse his
uniform to think that such a man as Wilkinson wears it, while
Clark is left to rot, to drink himself under the table from
disappointment, to plot with the damned Jacobins — "
“To plot!” I cried, starting violently in my turn.
The Captain looked at me in astonishment.
“How long have you been away from Louisville?” he asked.
“It will be a year,” I answered.
“Ah,” said the Captain, “I will tell you. It is more than a year
since Clark wrote Genet, since the Ambassador bestowed on him a
general’s commission in the army of the French Republic.”
“A general’s commission!” I exclaimed. "And he is going to
France?” The nation which had driven John Paul Jones from its
service was now to lose George Rogers Clark!
“To France!” laughed the Captain. "No, this is become France
enough. He is raising in Kentucky and in the Cumberland country an
army with a cursed, high-sounding name. Some of his old Illinois
scouts — McChesney, whom you mentioned, for one — have been collecting
bear’s meat and venison hams all winter. They are going to march
on Louisiana and conquer it for the French Republic, for Liberty,
Equality — the Rights of Man, anything you like.”
“On Louisiana!” I repeated; "what has the Federal government
been doing?”
The Captain winked at me and sat down.
“The Federal government is supine, a laughing-stock — so our
friends the Jacobins say, who have been shouting at Mr. Easton’s
tavern all winter. Nay, they declare that all this country west of
the mountains, too, will be broken off and set up into a republic,
and allied with that most glorious of all republics, France.
Believe me, the Jacobins have not been idle, and there have been
strange-looking birds of French plumage dodging between the
General’s house at Clarksville and the Bear Grass.”
I was silent, the tears almost forcing themselves to my eyes at
the pathetic sordidness of what I had heard.
“It can come to nothing,” continued the Captain, in a changed voice.
"General Clark’s mind is unhinged by — disappointment.
Mad Anthony
is not a man to be caught sleeping, and he has already attended to a little
expedition from the Cumberland. Mad Anthony loves the General, as we all
do, and the Federal government is wiser than the Jacobins think. It may
not be necessary to do anything.” Captain Wendell paused, and looked
at me fixedly. “Ritchie, General Clark likes you, and you have never
offended him. Why not go to his little house in Clarksville when you get
to Louisville and talk to him plainly, as I know you can? Perhaps you
might have some influence.”
I shook my head sadly.
“I intend to go,” I answered, “but I will have no influence.”
CHAPTER II.
the house above the falls
IT WAS May-day, and shortly after dawn we slipped into the quiet
water which is banked up for many miles above the Falls. The
Captain and I sat forward on the deck, breathing deeply the sharp
odor which comes from the wet forest in the early morning,
listening to the soft splash of the oars, and watching the green
form of Eighteen Mile Island as it gently drew nearer and nearer.
And ere the sun had risen greatly we had passed Twelve Mile
Island, and emerging from the narrow channel which divides Six
Mile Island from the northern shore, we beheld, on its terrace
above the Bear Grass, Louisville shining white in the morning sun.
Majestic in its mile of width, calm, as though gathering courage,
the river seemed to straighten for the ordeal to come, and the
sound of its waters crying over the rocks far below came faintly
to my ear and awoke memories of a day gone by. Fearful of the
suck, we crept along the Indian shore until we counted the boats
moored in the Bear Grass, and presently above the trees on our
right we saw the Stars and Stripes floating from the log bastion
of Fort Finney. And below the fort, on the gentle sunny slope to
the river’s brink, was spread the green garden of the garrison,
with its sprouting vegetables and fruit trees blooming pink and
white.
We were greeted by a company of buff and blue officers at the
landing, and I was bidden to breakfast at their mess, Captain
Wendell promising to take me over to Louisville afterwards. He had
business in the town, and about eight of the clock we crossed the
wide river in one of the barges of the fort and made fast at the
landing in the Bear Grass. But no sooner had we entered the town
than we met a number of country people on horseback, with their
wives and daughters — ay, and sweethearts — perched up behind them:
the men mostly in butternut linsey hunting shirts and trousers,
slouch hats, and red handkerchiefs stuck into their bosoms; the
women marvellously pretty and fresh in stiff cotton gowns and
Quaker hats, and some in crimped caps with ribbons neatly tied
under the chin. Before Mr. Easton’s tavern Joe Handy, the fiddler,
was reeling off a few bars of "Hey, Betty Martin" to the familiar
crowd of loungers under the big poplar.
“It’s Davy Ritchie!” shouted Joe, breaking off in the middle of
the tune; "welcome home, Davy. Ye’re jest in time for the barbecue
on the island.”
“And Cap Wendell! Howdy, Cap!” drawled another, a huge,
long-haired, sallow, dirty fellow. But the Captain only glared.
“Damn him!” he said, after I had spoken to Joe and we had passed
on, “he ought to be barbecued; he nearly bit off Ensign Barry’s
nose a couple of months ago. Barry tried to stop the beast in a
gouging fight.”
The bright morning, the shady streets, the homelike frame and
log houses, the old-time fragrant odor of cornpone wafted out of
the open doorways, the warm greetings, — all made me happy to be
back again. Mr. Crede rushed out and escorted us into his cool
store, and while he waited on his country customers bade his negro
brew a bowl of toddy, at the mention of which Mr. Bill Whalen,
chief habitue, roused himself from a stupor on a tobacco barrel.
Presently the customers, having indulged in the toddy, departed
for the barbecue, the Captain went to the fort, and Mr. Crede and
myself were left alone to talk over the business which had sent me
to Philadelphia.
At four o’clock, having finished my report and dined with my
client, I set out for Clarksville, for Mr. Crede had told me,
among other things, that the General was there. Louisville was
deserted, the tavern porch vacant; but tacked on the logs beside
the door was a printed bill which drew my curiosity. I stopped,
caught by a familiar name in large type at the head of it.
“GEORGE R. CLARK, ESQUIRE,
“MAJOR-GENERAL IN THE ARMIES OF FRANCE AND
COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF THE FRENCH REV-
OLUTIONARY LEGION ON THE
MISSISSIPPI RIVER.
“PROPOSALS
“For raising volunteers for the reduction of the Spanish posts
on the Mississippi, for opening the trade of the said river and
giving freedom to all its inhabitants — "
I had got so far when I heard a noise of footsteps within, and
Mr. Easton himself came out, in his shirt-sleeves.
“By cricky, Davy,” said he, “I’m right glad ter see ye ag’in.
Readin’ the General’s bill, are ye? Tarnation, I reckon Washington
and all his European fellers east of the mountains won’t be able
ter hold us back this time. I reckon we’ll gallop over Louisiany
in the face of all the Spaniards ever created. I’ve got some new
whiskey I ’low will sink tallow. Come in, Davy.”
As he took me by the arm, a laughter and shouting came from the
back room.
“It’s some of them Frenchy fellers come over from Knob Licks.
They’re in it,” and he pointed his thumb over his shoulder to the
proclamation, “and thar’s one young American among ’em who’s a
t’arer. Come in.”
I drank a glass of Mr. Easton’s whiskey, and asked about the
General.
“He stays over thar to Clarksville pretty much,” said Mr.
Easton. "Thar ain’t quite so much walkin’ araound ter do,” he
added significantly.
I made my way down to the water-side, where Jake Landrasse sat
alone on the gunwale of a Kentucky boat, smoking a clay pipe as he
fished. I had to exercise persuasion to induce Jake to paddle me
across, which he finally agreed to do on the score of old
friendship, and he declared that the only reason he was not at the
barbecue was because he was waiting to take a few gentlemen to see
General Clark. I agreed to pay the damages if he were late in
returning for these gentlemen, and soon he was shooting me with
pulsing strokes across the lake-like expanse towards the landing
at Fort Finney. Louisville and the fort were just above the head
of the Falls, and the little town of Clarksville, which Clark had
founded, at the foot of them. I landed, took the road that led
parallel with the river through the tender green of the woods, and
as I walked the mighty song which the Falls had sung for ages to
the Wilderness rose higher and higher, and the faint spray seemed
to be wafted through the forest and to hang in the air like the
odor of a summer rain.
It was May-day. The sweet, caressing note of the thrush mingled
with the music of the water, the dogwood and the wild plum were in
festal array; but my heart was heavy with thinking of a great man
who had cheapened himself. At length I came out upon a clearing
where fifteen log houses marked the grant of the Federal
government to Clark’s regiment. Perched on a tree-dotted knoll
above the last spasm of the waters in their two-mile race for
peace, was a two-storied log house with a little, square porch in
front of the door. As I rounded the corner of the house and came
in sight of the porch I halted — by no will of my own — at the sight
of a figure sunken in a wooden chair. It was that of my old
Colonel. His hands were folded in front of him, his eyes were
fixed but dimly on the forests of the Kentucky shore across the
water; his hair, uncared for, fell on the shoulders of his faded
blue coat, and the stained buff waistcoat was unbuttoned. For he
still wore unconsciously the colors of the army of the American
Republic.
“General!” I said.
He started, got to his feet, and stared at me.
“Oh, it’s — it’s Davy,” he said. "I — I was expecting — some
friends — Davy. What — what’s the matter, Davy?”
“I have been away. I am glad to see you again, General.
“Citizen General, sir, Major-general in the army of the French
Republic and Commander-in-chief of the French Revolutionary Legion
on the Mississippi.”
“You will always be Colonel Clark to me, sir,” I answered.
“You — you were the drummer boy, I remember, and strutted in front
of the regiment as if you were the colonel. Egad, I remember how
you fooled the Kaskaskians when you told them we were going away.”
He looked at me, but his eyes were still fixed on the point
beyond. "You were always older than I, Davy. Are you married?”
In spite of myself, I laughed as I answered this question.
“You are as canny as ever,” he said, putting his hand on my
shoulder. "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, — they are only possible
for the bachelor.” Hearing a noise, he glanced nervously in the
direction of the woods, only to perceive his negro carrying a pail
of water. "I — I was expecting some friends,” he said. "Sit down,
Davy.”
“I hope I am not intruding, General,” I said, not daring to look
at him.
“No, no, my son,” he answered, “you are always welcome. Did we
not campaign together? Did we not — shoot these very falls together
on our way to Kaskaskia?” He had to raise his voice above the roar
of the water. "Faith, well I remember the day. And you saved it,
Davy, — you, a little gamecock, a little worldly-wise
hop-o’-my-thumb, eh? Hamilton’s scalp hanging by a lock, egad — and
they frightened out of their five wits because it was growing
dark.” He laughed, and suddenly became solemn again. "There comes
a time in every man’s life when it grows dark, Davy, and then the
cowards are afraid. They have no friends whose hands they can
reach out and feel. But you are my friend. You remember that you
said you would always be my friend? It — it was in the fort at
Vincennes.”
“I remember, General.”
He rose from the steps, buttoned his waistcoat, and straightened
himself with an effort. He looked at me impressively.
“You have been a good friend indeed, Davy, a faithful friend,”
he said. "You came to me when I was sick, you lent me money,” — he
waved aside my protest. "I am happy to say that I shall soon be in
a position to repay you, to reward you. My evil days are over, and
I spurn that government which spurned me, for the honor and glory
of which I founded that city,” — he pointed in the direction of
Louisville, — "for the power and wealth of which I conquered this
Northwest territory. Listen! I am now in the service of a republic
where the people have rights, I am Commander-in-chief of the
French Revolutionary Legion on the Mississippi. Despite the
supineness of Washington, the American nation will soon be at war
with Spain. But my friends — and thank God they are many — will follow
me — they will follow me to Natchez and New Orleans, — ay, even to
Santa Fe and Mexico if I give the word. The West is with me, and
for the West I shall win the freedom of the Mississippi. For
France and Liberty I shall win back again Louisiana, and then I
shall be a Maréchal de Camp.”
I could not help thinking of a man who had not been wont to
speak of his intentions, who had kept his counsel for a year
before Kaskaskia.
“I need my drummer boy, Davy,” he said, his face lighting up,
"but he will not be a drummer boy now. He will be a trusted
officer of high rank, mind you. Come,” he cried, seizing me by the
arm, “I will write the commission this instant. But hold! you read
French, — I remember the day Father Gibault gave you your first
lesson.” He fumbled in his pocket, drew out a letter, and handed
it to me. "This is from Citizen Michaux, the famous naturalist,
the political agent of the French Republic. Read what he has
written me.”
I read, I fear in a faltering voice: —
“Citoyen Général:
“Un homme qui a donné des preuves de son amour pour la Liberté
et de sa haine pour le despotisme ne devait pas s’adresser en vain
au ministre de la République française. Général, il est temps que
les Americains libres de l’Ouest soient débarassés d’un ennemie
aussi injuste que méprisable.”
When I had finished I glanced at the General, but he seemed not
to be heeding me. The sun was setting above the ragged line of
forest, and a blue veil was spreading over the tumbling waters. He
took me by the arm and led me into the house, into a bare room
that was all awry. Maps hung on the wall, beside them the
General’s new commission, rudely framed. Among the littered papers
on the table were two whiskey bottles and several glasses, and
strewn about were a number of chairs, the arms of which had been
whittled by the General’s guests. Across the rough mantel-shelf
was draped the French tricolor, and before the fireplace on the
puncheons lay a huge bearskin which undoubtedly had not been
shaken for a year. Picking up a bottle, the General poured out
generous helpings in two of the glasses, and handed one to me.
“The mists are bad, Davy,” said he "I — I cannot afford to get the
fever now. Let us drink success to the army of the glorious
Republic, France.”
“Let us drink first, General,” I said, “to the old friendship
between us.”
“Good!” he cried. Tossing off his liquor, he set down the glass
and began what seemed a fruitless search among the thousand papers
on the table. But at length, with a grunt of satisfaction, he
produced a form and held it under my eyes. At the top of the sheet
was that much-abused and calumniated lady, the Goddess of Liberty.
“Now,” he said, drawing up a chair and dipping his quill into an
almost depleted ink-pot, “I have decided to make you, David
Ritchie, with full confidence in your ability and loyalty to the
rights of liberty and mankind, a captain in the Legion on the
Mississippi.”
I crossed the room swiftly, and as he put his pen to paper I
laid my hand on his arm.
“General, I cannot,” I said. I had seen from the first the
futility of trying to dissuade him from the expedition, and I knew
now that it would never come off. I was willing to make almost any
sacrifice rather than offend him, but this I could not allow. The
General drew himself up in his chair and stared at me with a flash
of his old look.
“You cannot?” he repeated; "you have affairs to attend to, I
take it.”
I tried to speak, but he rode me down.
“There is money to be made in that prosperous town of
Louisville.” He did not understand the pain which his words caused
me. He rose and laid his hands affectionately on my shoulders.
"Ah, Davy, commerce makes a man timid. Do you forget the old days
when I was the father and you the son? Come! I will make you a
fortune undreamed of, and you shall be my fianancier once more.”
“I had not thought of the money, General,” I answered, “and I
have always been ready to leave my business to serve a friend.”
“There, there,” said the General, soothingly, “I know it. I
would not offend you. You shall have the commission, and you may
come when it pleases you.”
He sat down again to write, but I restrained him.
“I cannot go, General,” I said.
“Thunder and fury,” cried the General, “a man might think you
were a weak-kneed Federalist.” He stared at me, and stared again,
and rose and recoiled a step. "My God,” he said, “you cannot be a
Federalist, you can’t have marched to Kaskaskia and Vincennes, you
can’t have been a friend of mine and have seen how the government
of the United States has treated me, and be a Federalist!”
It was an argument and an appeal which I had foreseen, yet which
I knew not how to answer. Suddenly there came, unbidden, his own
counsel which he had given me long ago, “Serve the people, as all
true men should in a Republic, but do not rely upon their
gratitude.” This man had bidden me remember that.
“General,” I said, trying to speak steadily, “it was you who
gave me my first love for the Republic. I remember you as you
stood on the heights above Kaskaskia waiting for the sun to go
down, and you reminded me that it was the nation’s birthday. And
you said that our nation was to be a refuge of the oppressed of
this earth, a nation made of all peoples, out of all time. And you
said that the lands beyond,” and I pointed to the West as he had
done, “should belong to it until the sun sets on the sea again.”
I glanced at him, for he was silent, and in my life I can recall
no sadder moment than this. The General heard, but the man who had
spoken these words was gone forever. The eyes of this man before
me were fixed, as it were, upon space. He heard, but he did not
respond; for the spirit was gone. What I looked upon was the
tortured body from which the genius — the spirit I had
worshipped — had fled. I turned away, only to turn back in anger.
“What do you know of this France for which you are to fight?” I
cried. "Have you heard of the thousands of innocents who are
slaughtered, of the women and children who are butchered in the
streets in the name of Liberty? What have those blood-stained
adventurers to do with Liberty, what have the fish-wives who love
the sight of blood to do with you that would fight for them? You
warned me that this people and this government to which you have
given so much would be ungrateful, — will the butchers and
fish-wives be more grateful?”
He caught only the word grateful, and he rose to his feet with
something of the old straightness and of the old power. And by
evil chance his eye, and mine, fell upon a sword hanging on the
farther wall. Well I remembered when he had received it, well I
knew the inscription on its blade, “Presented by the State of
Virginia to her beloved son, George Rogers Clark, who by the
conquest of Illinois and St. Vincennes extended her empire and
aided in the defence of her liberties.” By evil chance, I say, his
eye lighted on that sword. In three steps he crossed the room to
where it hung, snatched it from its scabbard, and ere I could
prevent him he had snapped it across his knee and flung the pieces
in a corner.
“So much for the gratitude of my country,” he said.
I had gone out on the little porch and stood gazing over the
expanse of forest and waters lighted by the afterglow. Then I felt
a hand upon my shoulder, I heard a familiar voice calling me by an
old name.
“Yes, General!” I turned wonderingly.
“You are a good lad, Davy. I trust you,” he said. “I — I was
expecting some friends.”
He lifted a hand that was not too steady to his brow and scanned
the road leading to the fort. Even as he spoke four figures
emerged from the woods, — undoubtedly the gentlemen who had held the
council at the inn that afternoon. We watched them in silence as
they drew nearer, and then something in the walk and appearance of
the foremost began to bother me. He wore a long, double-breasted,
claret-colored redingote that fitted his slim figure to
perfection, and his gait was the easy gait of a man who goes
through the world careless of its pitfalls. So intently did I
stare that I gave no thought to those who followed him. Suddenly,
when he was within fifty paces, a cry escaped me, — I should have
known that smiling, sallow, weakly handsome face anywhere in the
world.
The gentleman was none other than Monsieur Auguste de St. Gré.
At the foot of the steps he halted and swept his hand to his hat
with a military salute.
“Citizen General,” he said gracefully, “we come and pay our
respec’s to you and mek our report, and ver’ happy to see you look
well. Citoyens, Vive la République! — Hail to the Citizen General!”
“Vive la République! Vive le Général!” cried the three citizens
behind him.
“Citizens, you are very welcome,” answered the General, gravely,
as he descended the steps and took each of them by the hand.
“Citizens, allow me to introduce to you my old friend, Citizen
David Ritchie — ”
“Milles diables!” cried the Citizen St. Gré, seizing me by the
hand, “c’est mon cher ami, Monsieur Reetchie. Ver’ happy you have
this honor, Monsieur;" and snatching his wide-brimmed military
cocked hat from his head he made me a smiling, sweeping bow.
“What!” cried the General to me, “you know the Sieur de St. Gré,
Davy?”
“He is my guest once in Louisiane, mon général,” Monsieur
Auguste explained; "my family knows him.”
“You know the Sieur de St. Gré, Davy?” said the General again.
“Yes, I know him,” I answered, I fear with some brevity.
“Podden me,” said Auguste, “I am now Citizen Captain de St. Gré.
And you are also embark in the glorious cause — Ah, I am happy,” he
added, embracing me with a winning glance.
I was relieved from the embarrassment of denying the impeachment
by reason of being introduced to the other notables, to Citizen
Captain Sullivan, who wore an undress uniform consisting of a
cotton butternut hunting shirt. He had charge on the Bear Grass of
building the boats for the expedition, and was likewise a
prominent member of that august body, the Jacobin Society of
Lexington. Next came Citizen Quartermaster Depeau, now of Knob
Licks, Kentucky, sometime of New Orleans. The Citizen
Quartermaster wore his hair long in the backwoods fashion; he had
a keen, pale face and sunken eyes.
“Ver’ glad mek you known to me, Citizen Reetchie.”
The fourth gentleman was likewise French, and called Gignoux.
The Citizen Gignoux made some sort of an impression on me which I
did not stop to analyze. He was a small man, with a little round
hand that wriggled out of my grasp; he had a big French nose,
bright eyes that popped a little and gave him the habit of looking
sidewise, and grizzled, chestnut eyebrows over them. He had a
thin-lipped mouth and a round chin.
“Citizen Reetchie, is it? I laik to know citizen’s name
glorified by gran’ cause. Reetchie?”
“Will you enter, citizens?” said the General.
I do not know why I followed them unless it were to satisfy a
devil-prompted curiosity as to how Auguste de St. Gré had got
there. We went into the room, where the General’s slovenly negro
was already lighting the candles and the General proceeded to
collect and fill six of the glasses on the table. It was Citizen
Captain Sullivan who gave the toast.
“Citizens,” he cried, “I give you the health of the foremost
apostle of Liberty in the Western world, the General who tamed the
savage tribes, who braved the elements, who brought to their knees
the minions of a despot king.” A slight suspicion of a hiccough
filled this gap. "Cast aside by an ungrateful government, he is
still unfaltering in his allegiance to the people. May he lead our
Legion victorious through the Spanish dominions.
“Vive la République!” they shouted, draining their glasses.
“Vive le citoyen général Clark!”
“Louisiana!” shouted Citizen Sullivan, warming, “Louisiana,
groaning under oppression and tyranny, is imploring us with
uplifted hands. To those remaining veteran patriots whose
footsteps we followed to this distant desert, and who by their
blood and toil have converted it into a smiling country, we now
look. Under your guidance, Citizen General, we fought, we bled — "
How far the Citizen Captain would have gone is problematical. I
had noticed a look of disgust slowly creeping into the Citizen
Quartermaster’s eyes, and at this juncture he seized the Citizen
Captain and thrust him into a chair.
“Sacre vent!” he exclaimed, “it is the proclamation — he recites
the proclamation! I see he have participate in those handbill.
Poof, the world is to conquer, — let us not spik so much.”
“I give you one toast,” said the little Citizen Gignoux, slyly,
“we all bring back one wife from Nouvelle Orléans!”
“Ha,” exclaimed the Sieur de St. Gré, laughing, “the Citizen Captain
Depeau — he has already one wife in
Nouvelle Orléans.”
The Citizen Quartermaster was angry at this, and it did not
require any great perspicacity on my part to discover that he did
not love the Citizen de St. Gré.
“He is call in his country, Gumbo de St. Gré,” said Citizen
Depeau. "It is a deesh in that country. But to beesness,
citizens, — we embark on glorious enterprise. The King and Queen of
France, she pay for her treason with their haids, and we must be
prepare’ for do the sem.”
“Ha,” exclaimed the Sieur de St. Gré, “the Citizen Quartermaster
will lose his provision before his haid.”
The inference was plain, and the Citizen Quartermaster was quick
to take it up.
“We are all among frien’s,” said he. "Why I call you Gumbo de
St. Gré? When I come first settle in Louisiane you was wild
man — yes. Drink tafia, fight duel, spend family money. Aristocrat
then. No, I not hold my tongue. You go France and Monsieur le
Marquis de St. Gré he get you in gardes du corps of the King. Yes,
I tell him. You tell the Citizen General how come you Jacobin now,
and we see if he mek you Captain.”
A murmur of surprise escaped from several of the company, and
they all stared at the Sieur de St. Gré. But General Clark brought
down his fist on the table with something of his old-time vigor,
and the glasses rattled.
“Gentlemen, I will have no quarrelling in my presence,” he
cried; "and I beg to inform Citizen Depeau that I bestow my
commissions where it pleases me.”
Auguste de St. Gré rose, flushing, to his feet. "Citizens,” he
said, with a fluency that was easy for him, “I never mek secret of
my history — no. It is true my relation, Monsieur le Marquis de St.
Gre, bought me a pair of colors in the King’s gardes du corps.”
“And is it not truth you tremple the coackade, what I hear from
Philadelphe?” cried Depeau.
Monsieur Auguste smiled with a patient tolerance.
“If you hev pains to mek inquiry,” said he, “you must learn that
I join le Marquis de La Fayette and the National Guard. That I
have since fight for the Revolution. That I am come now home to
fight for Louisiane, as Monsieur Genet will tell you whom I saw in
Philadelphe.”
“The Citizen Capitaine — he spiks true.”
All eyes were turned towards Gignoux, who had been sitting back
in his chair, very quiet.
“It is true what he say,” he repeated, “I have it by Monsieur
Genet himself.”
“Gentlemen,” said General Clark, “this is beside the question,
and I will not have these petty quarrels. I may as well say to you
now that I have chosen the Citizen Captain to go at once to New
Orleans and organize a regiment among the citizens there faithful
to France. On account of his family and supposed Royalist
tendencies he will not be suspected. I fear that a month at least
has yet to elapse before our expedition can move.”
“It is one wise choice,” put in Monsieur Gignoux.
“Monsieur le général and gentlemen,” said the Sieur de St. Gré,
gracefully, “I thank you ver’ much for the confidence. I leave by
first flatboat and will have all things stir up when you come. The
citizens of Louisiane await you. If necessair, we have hole in
levee ready to cut.”
“Citizens,” interrupted General Clark, sitting down before the
ink-pot, “let us hear the Quartermaster’s report of the supplies
at Knob Licks, and Citizen Sullivan’s account of the boats. But
hold,” he cried, glancing around him, “where is Captain Temple? I
heard that he had come to Louisville from the Cumberland to-day.
Is he not going with you to New Orleans, St. Gré?”
I took up the name involuntarily.
“Captain Temple,” I repeated, while they stared at me. "Nicholas
Temple?”
It was Auguste de St. Gré who replied.
“The sem,” he said. "I recall he was along with you in Nouvelle
Orléans. He is at ze tavern, and he has had one gran’ fight, and
he is ver’ — I am sorry — intoxicate — "
I know not how I made my way through the black woods to Fort
Finney, where I discovered Jake Landrasse and his canoe. The road
was long, and yet short, for my brain whirled with the expectation
of seeing Nick again, and the thought of this poor, pathetic,
ludicrous expedition compared to the sublime one I had known.
George Rogers Clark had come to this!
“THEY HAVE gran’ time in Louisville to-night, Davy,” said Jake
Landrasse, as he paddled me towards the Kentucky shore; “you
hear?”
“I should be stone deaf if I didn’t,” I answered, for the
shouting which came from the town filled me with forebodings.
“They come back from the barbecue full of whiskey,” said Jake,
"and a young man at the tavern come out on the porch and he say,
’Get ready you all to go to Louisiana! You been hole back long
enough by tyranny.’ Sam Barker come along and say he a Federalist.
They done have a gran’ fight, he and the young feller, and Sam got
licked. He went at Sam just like a harricane.”
“And then?” I demanded.
“Them four wanted to leave,” said Jake, taking no trouble to
disguise his disgust, “and I had to fetch ’em over. I’ve got to go
back and wait for ’em now,” and he swore with sincere
disappointment. "I reckon there ain’t been such a jamboree in town
for years.”
Jake had not exaggerated. Gentlemen from Moore’s Settlement,
from Sullivan’s Station on the Bear Grass, — to be brief, the entire
male population of the county seemed to have moved upon Louisville
after the barbecue, and I paused involuntarily at the sight which
met my eyes as I came into the street. A score of sputtering,
smoking pine-knots threw a lurid light on as many hilarious
groups, and revealed, fantastically enough, the boles and lower
branches of the big shade trees above them. Navigation for the
individual, difficult enough lower down, in front of the tavern
became positively dangerous. There was a human eddy, — nay, a
maelstrom would better describe it. Fights began, but ended
abortively by reason of the inability of the combatants to keep
their feet; one man whose face I knew passed me with his hat
afire, followed by several companions in gusts of laughter, for
the torch-bearers were careless and burned the ears of their
friends in their enthusiasm. Another person whom I recognized
lacked a large portion of the front of his attire, and seemed
sublimely unconscious of the fact. His face was badly scratched.
Several other friends of mine were indulging in brief intervals of
rest on the ground, and I barely avoided stepping on them. Still
other gentlemen were delivering themselves of the first impressive
periods of orations, only to be drowned by the cheers of their
auditors. These were the snatches which I heard as I picked my way
onward with exaggerated fear: —
“Gentlemen, the Mississippi is ours, let the tyrants who forbid
its use beware!” "To hell with the Federal government!” "I tell
you, sirs, this land is ours. We have conquered it with our blood,
and I reckon no Spaniard is goin’ to stop us. We ain’t come this
far to stand still. We settled Kaintuck, fit off the redskins, and
we’ll march across the Mississippi and on and on — " "To Louisiany!”
they shouted, and the whole crowd would take it up, “To Louisiany!
Open the river!”
So absorbed was I in my own safety and progress that I did not
pause to think (as I have often thought since) of the full meaning
of this, though I had marked it for many years. The support given
to Wilkinson’s plots, to Clark’s expedition, was merely the
outward and visible sign of the onward sweep of a resistless race.
In spite of untold privations and hardships, of cruel warfare and
massacre, these people had toiled over the mountains into this
land, and impatient of check or hindrance would, even as Clark had
predicted, when their numbers were sufficient leap the
Mississippi. Night or day, drunk or sober, they spoke of this
thing with an ever increasing vehemence, and no man of reflection
who had read their history could say that they would be thwarted.
One day Louisiana would be theirs and their children’s for the
generations to come. One day Louisiana would be American.
That I was alive and unscratched when I got as far as the tavern
is a marvel. Amongst all the passion-lit faces which surrounded me
I could get no sight of Nick’s, and I managed to make my way to a
momentarily quiet corner of the porch. As I leaned against the
wall there, trying to think what I should do, there came a great
cheering from a little way up the street, and then I straightened
in astonishment. Above the cheering came the sound of a drum
beaten in marching time, and above that there burst upon the night
what purported to be the "Marseillaise,” taken up and bawled by a
hundred drunken throats and without words. Those around me who
were sufficiently nimble began to run towards the noise, and I ran
after them. And there, marching down the middle of the street at
the head of a ragged and most indecorous column of twos, in the
centre of a circle of light cast by a pine-knot which Joe Handy
held, was Mr. Nicholas Temple. His bearing, if a trifle unsteady,
was proud, and — if I could believe my eyes — around his neck was
slung the thing which I prized above all my possessions, — the drum
which I had carried to Kaskaskia and Vincennes! He had taken it
from the peg in my room.
I shrink from putting on paper the sentimental side of my
nature, and indeed I could give no adequate idea of my affection
for that drum. And then there was Nick, who had been lost to me
for five years! My impulse was to charge the procession, seize
Nick and the drum together, and drag them back to my room; but the
futility and danger of such a course were apparent, and the
caution for which I am noted prevented my undertaking it. The
procession, augmented by all those to whom sufficient power of
motion remained, cheered by the helpless but willing ones on the
ground, swept on down the street and through the town. Even at
this late day I shame to write it! Behold me, David Ritchie,
Federalist, execrably sober, at the head of the column behind the
leader. Was it twenty minutes, or an hour, that we paraded? This I
know, that we slighted no street in the little town of Louisville.
What was my bearing, — whether proud or angry or carelessly
indifferent, — I know not. The glare of Joe Handy’s torch fell on my
face, Joe Handy’s arm and that of another gentleman, the worse for
liquor, were linked in mine, and they saw fit to applaud at every
step my conversion to the cause of Liberty. We passed time and
time again the respectable door-yards of my Federalist friends,
and I felt their eyes upon me with that look which the angels have
for the fallen. Once, in front of Mr. Wharton’s house, Mr. Handy
burned my hair, apologized, staggered, and I took the torch! And I
used it to good advantage in saving the drum from capture. For Mr.
Temple, with all the will in the world, had begun to stagger. At
length, after marching seemingly half the night, they halted by
common consent before the house of a prominent Democrat who shall
be nameless, and, after some minutes of vain importuning, Nick,
with a tattoo on the drum, marched boldly up to the gate and into
the yard. A desperate cunning came to my aid. I flung away the
torch, leaving the head of the column in darkness, broke from Mr.
Handy’s embrace, and, seizing Nick by the arm, led him onward
through the premises, he drumming with great docility. Followed by
a few stragglers only (some of whom went down in contact with the
trees of the orchard), we came to a gate at the back which I knew
well, which led directly into the little yard that fronted my own
rooms behind Mr. Crede’s store. Pulling Nick through the gate, I
slammed it, and he was only beginning to protest when I had him
safe within my door, and the bolt slipped behind him. As I struck
a light something fell to the floor with a crash, an odor of
alcohol filled the air, and as the candle caught the flame I saw a
shattered whiskey bottle at my feet and a room which had been
given over to carousing. In spite of my feelings I could not but
laugh at the perfectly irresistible figure my cousin made, as he
stood before me with the drum slung in front of him. His hat was
gone, his dust-covered clothes awry, but he smiled at me benignly
and without a trace of surprise.
“Sho you’ve come back at lasht, Davy,” he said. "You’re — you’re
very — irregular. You’ll lose — law bishness. Y-you’re worse’n Andy
Jackson — he’s always fightin’.”
I relieved him, unprotesting, of the drum, thanking my stars
there was so much as a stick left of it. He watched me with a
silent and exaggerated interest as I laid it on the table. From a
distance without came the shouts of the survivors making for the
tavern.
“’Sfortunate you had the drum, Davy,” he said gravely, “’rwe’d
had no procession.”
“It is fortunate I have it now,” I answered, looking ruefully at
the battered rim where Nick had missed the skin in his ardor.
“Davy,” said he, “funny thing — I didn’t know you wash a Jacobite.
Sh’ou hear,” he added relevantly, “th’ Andy Jackson was married?”
“No,” I answered, having no great interest in Mr. Jackson.
"Where have you been seeing him again?”
“Nashville on Cumberland. Jackson’sh county sholicitor, — devil of
a man. I’ll tell you, Davy,” he continued, laying an uncertain
hand on my shoulder and speaking with great earnestness, “I had
Chicashaw horse — Jackson’d Virginia thoroughbred — had a race — ’n’
Jackson wanted to shoot me ’n’ I wanted to shoot Jackson. ’N’ then
we all went to the Red Heifer — "
“What the deuce is the Red Heifer?” I asked.
“’N’dishtillery over a shpring, ’n’ they blow a horn when the
liquor runsh. ’N’ then we had supper in Major Lewish’s tavern.
Major Lewis came in with roast pig on platter. You know roast pig,
Davy?... ’N’ Jackson pulls out’s hunting knife n’waves it very
mashestic.... You know how mashestic Jackson is when
he — wantshtobe?” He let go my shoulder, brushed back his hair in a
fiery manner, and, seizing a knife which unhappily lay on the
table, gave me a graphic illustration of Mr. Jackson about to
carve the pig, I retreating, and he coming on. "N’ when he stuck
the pig, Davy, — "
He poised the knife for an instant in the air, and then, before
I could interpose, he brought it down deftly through the head of
my precious drum, and such a frightful, agonized squeal filled the
room that even I shivered involuntarily, and for an instant I had
a vivid vision of a pig struggling in the hands of a butcher. I
laughed in spite of myself. But Nick regarded me soberly.
“Funny thing, Davy,” he said, “they all left the room.” For a
moment he appeared to be ruminating on this singular phenomenon.
Then he continued: "’N’ Jackson was back firsht, ’n’ he was damned
impolite.... ’n’ he shook his fist in my face" (here Nick
illustrated Mr. Jackson’s gesture), “’n’ he said, ’Great God, sir,
y’ have a fine talent but if y’ ever do that again, I’ll — I’ll kill
you.’... That’sh what he said, Davy.”
“How long have you been in Nashville, Nick?” I asked.
“A year,” he said, “lookin’ after property I won
rattle-an’-shnap — you remember?”
“And why didn’t you let me know you were in Nashville?” I asked,
though I realized the futility of the question.
“Thought you was — mad at me,” he answered, “but you ain’t, Davy.
You’ve been very good-natured t’ let me have your drum.” He
straightened. "I am ver’ much obliged.”
“And where were you before you went to Nashville?” I said.
“Charleston, ’Napolis... Philadelphia... everywhere,” he
answered.
“Now,” said he, “’mgoin’ t’ bed.”
I applauded this determination, but doubted whether he meant to
carry it out. However, I conducted him to the back room, where he
sat himself down on the edge of my four-poster, and after
conversing a little longer on the subject of Mr. Jackson (who
seemed to have gotten upon his brain), he toppled over and
instantly fell asleep with his clothes on. For a while I stood
over him, the old affection welling up so strongly within me that
my eyes were dimmed as I looked upon his face. Spare and handsome
it was, and boyish still, the weaker lines emphasized in its
relaxation. Would that relentless spirit with which he had been
born make him, too, a wanderer forever? And was it not the
strangest of fates which had impelled him to join this madcap
expedition of this other man I loved, George Rogers Clark?
I went out, closed the door, and lighting another candle took
from my portfolio a packet of letters. Two of them I had not read,
having found them only on my return from Philadelphia that
morning. They were all signed simply "Sarah Temple,” they were
dated at a certain number in the Rue Bourbon, New Orleans, and
each was a tragedy in that which it had left unsaid. There was no
suspicion of heroics, there was no railing at fate; the letters
breathed but the one hope, — that her son might come again to that
happiness of which she had robbed him. There were in all but
twelve, and they were brief, for some affliction had nearly
deprived the lady of the use of her right hand. I read them twice
over, and then, despite the lateness of the hour, I sat staring at
the candles, reflecting upon my own helplessness. I was startled
from this revery by a knock. Rising hastily, I closed the door of
my bedroom, thinking I had to do with some drunken reveller who
might be noisy. The knock was repeated. I slipped back the bolt
and peered out into the night.
“I saw dat light,” said a voice which I recognized; "I think I
come in to say good night.”
I opened the door, and he walked in.
“You are one night owl, Monsieur Reetchie,” he said.
“And you seem to prefer the small hours for your visits,
Monsieur de St. Gré,” I could not refrain from replying.
He swept the room with a glance, and I thought a shade of
disappointment passed over his face. I wondered whether he were
looking for Nick. He sat himself down in my chair, stretched out
his legs, and regarded me with something less than his usual
complacency.
“I have much laik for you, Monsieur Reetchie,” he began, and
waved aside my bow of acknowledgment "Before I go away from
Louisville I want to spik with you, — this is a risson why I am
here. You listen to what dat Depeau he say, — dat is not truth. My
family knows you, I laik to have you hear de truth.”
He paused, and while I wondered what revelations he was about to
make, I could not repress my impatience at the preamble.
“You are my frien’, you have prove it,” he continued. "You
remember las’ time we meet?” (I smiled involuntarily.) "You was in
bed, but you not need be ashame’ for me. Two days after I went to
France, and I not in New Orleans since.”
“Two days after you saw me?” I repeated.
“Yaas, I run away. That was the mont’ of August, 1789, and we
have not then heard in New Orleans that the Bastille is attack. I
lan’ at La Havre, — it is the en’ of Septembre. I go to the château
de St. Gré — great iron gates, long avenue of poplar, — big house all
’round a court, and Monsieur le Marquis is at Versailles. I borrow
three louis from the concierge, and I go to Versailles to the
hotel of Monsieur le Marquis. There is all dat trouble what you
read about going on, and Monsieur le Marquis he not so glad to see
me for dat risson. ‘Mon cher Auguste,’ he cry, ‘you want to be of
officier in gardes de corps? You are not afred?’” (Auguste
stiffened.) “‘I am a St. Gré, Monsieur le Marquis. I am afred of
nothings,’ I answered. He tek me to the King, I am made
lieutenant, the mob come and the King and Queen are carry off to
Paris. The King is prisoner, Monsieur le Marquis goes back to the
château de St. Gré. France is a republic. Monsieur —
que voulez-vous?”
(The Sieur de St. Gré shrugged his shoulders.) “I,
too, become Republican. I become officier in the National
Guard, — one must move with the time. Is it not so, Monsieur? I
deman’ of you if you ever expec’ to see a St. Gré a Republican.”
I expressed my astonishment.
“I give up my right, my principle, my family. I come to
America — I go to New Orleans where I have influence and I stir up
revolution for France, for Liberty. Is it not noble cause?”
I had it on the tip of my tongue to ask Monsieur Auguste why he
left France, but the uselessness of it was apparent.
“You see, Monsieur, I am justify before you, before my
frien’s, — that is all I care,” and he gave another shrug in
defiance of the world at large. "What I have done, I have done for
principle. If I remain Royalist, I might have marry my cousin,
Mademoiselle de St. Gré. Ha, Monsieur, you remember — the miniature
you were so kin’ as to borrow me four hundred livres?”
“I remember,” I said.
“It is because I have much confidence in you, Monsieur,” he
said, “it is because I go — peut-être — to dangere, to death, that I
come here and ask you to do me a favor.”
“You honor me too much, Monsieur,” I answered, though I could
scarce refrain from smiling.
“It is because of your charactair,” Monsieur Auguste was good
enough to say. "You are to be repose’ in, you are to be rely on.
Sometime I think you ver’ ole man. And this is why, and sence you
laik objects of art, that I bring this and ask you keep it while I
am in dangere.”
I was mystified. He thrust his hand into his coat and drew forth
an oval object wrapped in dirty paper, and then disclosed to my
astonished eyes the miniature of Mademoiselle de St. Gré, — the
miniature, I say, for the gold back and setting were lacking.
Auguste had retained only the ivory, — whether from sentiment or
necessity I will not venture. The sight of it gave me a strange
sensation, and I can scarcely write of the anger and disgust which
surged over me, of the longing to snatch it from his trembling
fingers. Suddenly I forgot Auguste in the lady herself. There was
something emblematical in the misfortune which had bereft the
picture of its setting. Even so the Revolution had taken from her
a brilliant life, a king and queen, home and friends. Yet the
spirit remained unquenchable, set above its mean surroundings, — ay,
and untouched by them. I was filled with a painful curiosity to
know what had become of her, which I repressed. Auguste’s voice
aroused me.
“Ah, Monsieur, is it not a face to love, to adore?”
“It is a face to obey,” I answered, with some heat, and with
more truth than I knew.
“Mon Dieu, Monsieur, it is so. It is that mek me love — you know
not how. You know not what love is, Monsieur Reetchie, you never
love laik me. You have not sem risson. Monsieur,” he continued,
leaning forward and putting his hand on my knee, “I think she love
me — I am not sure. I should not be surprise’. But Monsieur le
Marquis, her father, he trit me ver’ bad. Monsieur le Marquis is
guillotine’ now, I mus’ not spik evil of him, but he marry her to
one ol’ garçon, Le Vicomte d’Ivry-le-Tour.”
“So Mademoiselle is married,” I said after a pause.
“Oui, she is Madame la Vicomtesse now; I fall at her feet jus’
the sem. I hear of her once at Bel Oeil, the château of Monsieur
le Prince de Ligne in Flander’. After that they go I know not
where. They are exile’, — los’ to me.” He sighed, and held out the
miniature to me. "Monsieur, I esk you favor. Will you be as kin’
and keep it for me again?”
I have wondered many times since why I did not refuse. Suffice
it to say that I took it. And Auguste’s face lighted up.
“I am a thousan’ times gret’ful,” he cried; and added, as though
with an afterthought, “Monsieur, would you be so kin’ as to borrow
me fif’ dollars?”
CHAPTER IV.
of a sudden resolution
IT WAS nearly morning when I fell asleep in my chair, from sheer
exhaustion, for the day before had been a hard one, even for me. I
awoke with a start, and sat for some minutes trying to collect my
scattered senses. The sun streamed in at my open door, the birds
hopped on the lawn, and the various sounds of the bustling life of
the little town came to me from beyond. Suddenly, with a
glimmering of the mad events of the night, I stood up, walked
uncertainly into the back room, and stared at the bed.
It was empty. I went back into the outer room; my eye wandered
from the shattered whiskey bottle, which was still on the floor,
to the table littered with Mrs. Temple’s letters. And there, in
the midst of them, lay a note addressed with my name in a big,
unformed hand. I opened it mechanically.
“Dear Davy,” — so it ran, — "I have gone away, I cannot tell you where.
Some day I will come back and you will forgive me. God bless you!
Nick.”
He had gone away! To New Orleans? I had long ceased trying to
account for Nick’s actions, but the more I reflected, the more
incredible it seemed to me that he should have gone there, of all
places. And yet I had had it from Clark’s own lips (indiscreet
enough now!) that Nick and St. Gré were to prepare the way for an
insurrection there. My thoughts ran on to other possibilities;
would he see his mother? But he had no reason to know that Mrs.
Temple was still in New Orleans. Then my glance fell on her
letters, lying open on the table. Had he read them? I put this
down as improbable, for he was a man who held strictly to a point
of honor.
And then there was Antoinette de St. Gré! I ceased to conjecture
here, dashed some water in my eyes, pulled myself together, and,
seizing my hat, hurried out into the street. I made a sufficiently
indecorous figure as I ran towards the water-side, barely nodding
to my acquaintances on the way. It was a fresh morning, a river
breeze stirred the waters of the Bear Grass, and as I stood,
scanning the line of boats there, I heard footsteps behind me. I
turned to confront a little man with grizzled, chestnut eyebrows.
He was none other than the Citizen Gignoux.
“You tek ze air, Monsieur Reetchie?” said he. "You look for some
one, yes? You git up too late see him off.”
I made a swift resolve never to quibble with this man.
“So Mr. Temple has gone to New Orleans with the Sieur de St.
Gre,” I said.
Citizen Gignoux laid a fat finger on one side of his great nose.
The nose was red and shiny, I remember, and glistened in the
sunlight.
“Ah,” said he, “’tis no use tryin’ hide from you. However,
Monsieur Reetchie, you are the ver’ soul of honor. And then your
frien’! I know you not betray the Sieur de St. Gré. He is ver’
fon’ of you.”
“Betray!” I exclaimed; "there is no question of betrayal. As far
as I can see, your plans are carried on openly, with a fine
contempt for the Federal government.”
He shrugged his shoulders.
“’Tis not my doin’,” he said, “but I am — what you call it? — a
cipher. Sicrecy is what I believe. But drink too much, talk too
much — is it not so, Monsieur? And if Monsieur le Baron de
Carondelet, ze governor, hear they are in New Orleans, I think
they go to Havana or Brazil.” He smiled, but perhaps the
expression of my face caused him to sober abruptly. "It is
necessair for the cause. We must have good Revolution in
Louisiane.”
A suspicion of this man came over me, for a childlike simplicity
characterized the other ringleaders in this expedition. Clark had
had acumen once, and lost it; St. Gré was a fool; Nick Temple was
leading purposely a reckless life; the Citizens Sullivan and
Depeau had, to say the least, a limited knowledge of affairs. All
of these were responding more or less sincerely to the cry of the
people of Kentucky (every day more passionate) that something be
done about Louisiana. But Gignoux seemed of a different feather.
Moreover, he had been too shrewd to deny what Colonel Clark would
have denied in a soberer moment, — that St. Gré and Nick had gone to
New Orleans.
“You not spik, Monsieur. You not think they have success. You
are not Federalist, no, for I hear you march las night with your
frien’, — I hear you wave torch.”
“You make it your business to hear a great deal, Monsieur
Gignoux,” I retorted, my temper slipping a little.
He hastened to apologize.
“Mille pardons, Monsieur,” he said; "I see you are
Federalist — but drunk. Is it not so? Monsieur, you tink this ver’
silly thing — this expedition.”
“Whatever I think, Monsieur,” I answered, “I am a friend of
General Clark’s.”
“An enemy of ze cause?” he put in.
“Monsieur,” I said, “if President Washington and General Wayne
do not think it worth while to interfere with your plans, neither
do I.”
I left him abruptly, and went back to my long-delayed affairs
with a heavy heart. The more I thought, the more criminally
foolish Nick’s journey seemed to me. However puerile the
undertaking, De Lemos at Natchez and Carondelet at New Orleans had
not the reputation of sleeping at their posts, and their hatred
for Americans was well known. I sought General Clark, but he had
gone to Knob Licks, and in my anxiety I lay awake at nights
tossing in my bed.
One evening, perhaps four days after Nick’s departure, I went
into the common room of the tavern, and there I was surprised to
see an old friend. His square, saffron face was just the same, his
little jet eyes snapped as brightly as ever, his hair — which was
swept high above his forehead and tied in an eelskin behind — was as
black as when I had seen it at Kaskaskia. I had met Monsieur Vigo
many times since, for he was a familiar figure amongst the towns
of the Ohio and the Mississippi, and from Vincennes to Anse a la
Graisse, and even to New Orleans. His reputation as a financier
was greater than ever. He was talking to my friend, Mr. Marshall,
but he rose when he saw me, with a beaming smile.
“Ha, it is Davy,” he cried, “but not the sem lil drummer boy who
would not come into my store. Reech lawyer now, — I hear you make
much money now, Davy.”
“Congress money?” I said.
Monsieur Vigo threw out his hands, and laughed exactly as he had
done in his log store at Kaskaskia.
“Congress have never repay me one sou,” said Monsieur Vigo,
making a face. "I have try — I have talk — I have represent — it is no
good. Davy, it is your fault. You tell me tek dat money. You call
dat finance?”
“David,” said Mr. Marshall, sharply, “what the devil is this I
hear of your carrying a torch in a Jacobin procession?”
“You may put it down to liquor, Mr. Marshall,” I answered.
“Then you must have had a cask, egad,” said Mr. Marshall, “for I
never saw you drunk.”
I laughed.
“I shall not attempt to explain it, sir,” I answered.
“You must not allow your drum to drag you into bad company
again,” said he, and resumed his conversation. As I suspected, it
was a vigorous condemnation of General Clark and his new
expedition. I expressed my belief that the government did not
regard it seriously, and would forbid the enterprise at the proper
time.
“You are right, sir,” said Mr. Marshall, bringing down his fist
on the table. "I have private advices from Philadelphia that the
President’s consideration for Governor Shelby is worn out, and
that he will issue a proclamation within the next few days warning
all citizens at their peril from any connection with the pirates.”
I laughed.
“As a matter of fact, Mr. Marshall,” said I, “Citizen Genet has
been liberal with nothing except commissions, and they have
neither money nor men.”
“The rascals have all left town,” said Mr. Marshall. "Citizen
Quartermaster Depeau, their local financier, has gone back to his
store at Knob Licks. The Sieur de St. Gré and a Mr. Temple, as
doubtless you know, have gone to New Orleans. And the most
mysterious and therefore the most dangerous of the lot, Citizen
Gignoux, has vanished like an evil spirit. It is commonly supposed
that he, too, has gone down the river. You may see him, Vigo,”
said Mr. Marshall, turning to the trader; "he is a little man with
a big nose and grizzled chestnut eyebrows.”
“Ah, I know a lil ’bout him,” said Monsieur Vigo; "he was on my
boat two days ago, asking me questions.”
“The devil he was!” said Mr. Marshall.
I had another disquieting night, and by the morning I had made
up my mind. The sun was glinting on the placid waters of the river
when I made my way down to the bank, to a great ten-oared keel
boat that lay on the Bear Grass, with its square sail furled. An
awning was stretched over the deck, and at a walnut table covered
with papers sat Monsieur Vigo, smoking his morning pipe.
“Davy,” said he, “you have come à la bonne heure. At ten I
depart for New Orleans.” He sighed. "It is so long voyage,” he
added, “and so lonely one. Sometime I have the good fortune to
pick up a companion, but not to-day.”
“Do you want me to go with you?” I said.
He looked at me incredulously.
“I should be delighted,” he said, “but you mek a jest.”
“I was never more serious in my life,” I answered, “for I have
business in New Orleans. I shall be ready.”
“Ha,” cried Monsieur Vigo, hospitably, “I shall be enchant. We
will talk philosophe, Beaumarchais, Voltaire, Rousseau.”
For Monsieur Vigo was a great reader, and we had often indulged
in conversation which (we flattered ourselves) had a literary
turn.
I spent the remaining hours arranging with a young lawyer of my
acquaintance to look after my business, and at ten o’clock I was
aboard the keel boat with my small baggage. At eleven, Monsieur
Vigo and I were talking “philosophe” over a wonderful breakfast
under the awning, as we dropped down between the forest-lined
shores of the Ohio. My host travelled in luxury, and we ate the
Creole dishes, which his cook prepared, with silver forks which he
kept in a great chest in the cabin.
You who read this may feel something of my impatience to get to
New Orleans, and hence I shall not give a long account of the
journey. What a contrast it was to that which Nick and I had taken
five years before in Monsieur Gratiot’s fur boat! Like all
successful Creole traders, Monsieur Vigo had a wonderful knack of
getting on with the Indians, and often when we tied up of a night
the chief men of a tribe would come down to greet him. We slipped
southward on the great, yellow river which parted the wilderness,
with its sucks and eddies and green islands, every one of which
Monsieur knew, and I saw again the flocks of water-fowl and herons
in procession, and hawks and vultures wheeling in their search.
Sometimes a favorable wind sprang up, and we hoisted the sail. We
passed the Walnut Hills, the Nogales, the moans of the alligators
broke our sleep by night, and at length we came to Natchez, ruled
over now by that watch-dog of the Spanish King, Gayoso de Lemos.
Thanks to Monsieur Vigo, his manners were charming and his
hospitality gracious, and there was no trouble whatever about my
passport.
Our progress was slow when we came at last to the belvedered
plantation houses amongst the orange groves; and as we sat on the
wide galleries in the summer nights, we heard all the latest
gossip of the capital of Louisiana. The river was low; there was
an ominous quality in the heat which had its effect, indeed, upon
me, and made the old Creoles shake their heads and mutter a word
with a terrible meaning. New Orleans was a cesspool, said the
enlightened. The Baron de Carondelet, indefatigable man, aimed at
digging a canal to relieve the city of its filth, but this would
be the year when it was most needed, and it was not dug. Yes,
Monsieur le Baron was energy itself. That other fever — the
political one — he had scotched. "Ça Ira" and "La Marseillaise" had
been sung in the theatres, but not often, for the Baron had sent
the alcaldes to shut them up. Certain gentlemen of French ancestry
had gone to languish in the Morro at Havana. Yes, Monsieur de
Carondelet, though fat, was on horseback before dawn, New Orleans
was fortified as it never had been before, the militia organized,
real cannon were on the ramparts which could shoot at a pinch.
Sub rosa, I found much sympathy among the planters with the
Rights of Man. What had become, they asked, of the expedition of
Citizen General Clark preparing in the North? They may have sighed
secretly when I painted it in its true colors, but they loved
peace, these planters. Strangely enough, the name of Auguste de
St. Gré never crossed their lips, and I got no trace of him or
Nick at any of these places. Was it possible that they might not
have come to New Orleans after all?
Through the days, when the sun beat upon the awning with a
tropical fierceness, when Monsieur Vigo abandoned himself to his
siestas, I thought. It was perhaps characteristic of me that I
waited nearly three weeks to confide in my old friend the purpose
of my journey to New Orleans. It was not because I could not trust
him that I held my tongue, but because I sought some way of
separating the more intimate story of Nick’s mother and his affair
with Antoinette de St. Gré from the rest of the story. But
Monsieur Vigo was a man of importance in Louisiana, and I
reflected that a time might come when I should need his help. One
evening, when we were tied up under the oaks of a bayou, I told
him. There emanated from Monsieur Vigo a sympathy which few men
possess, and this I felt strongly as he listened, breaking his
silence only at long intervals to ask a question. It was a still
night, I remember, of great beauty, with a wisp of a moon hanging
over the forest line, the air heavy with odors and vibrant with a
thousand insect tones.
“And what you do, Davy?” he said at length.
“I must find my cousin and St. Gré before they have a chance to
get into much mischief,” I answered. "If they have already made a
noise, I thought of going to the Baron de Carondelet and telling
him what I know of the expedition. He will understand what St. Gré
is, and I will explain that Mr. Temple’s reckless love of
adventure is at the bottom of his share in the matter.”
“Bon, Davy,” said my host, “if you go, I go with you. But I
believe ze Baron think Morro good place for them jus’ the sem. Ze
Baron has been make misérable with Jacobins. But I go with you if
you go.”
He discoursed for some time upon the quality of the St. Gré’s,
their public services, and before he went to sleep he made the
very just remark that there was a flaw in every string of beads.
As for me, I went down into the cabin, surreptitiously lighted a
candle, and drew from my pocket that piece of ivory which had so
strangely come into my possession once more. The face upon it had
haunted me since I had first beheld it. The miniature was wrapped
now in a silk handkerchief which Polly Ann had bought for me in
Lexington. Shall I confess it? — I had carefully rubbed off the
discolorations on the ivory at the back, and the picture lacked
now only the gold setting. As for the face, I had a kind of
consolation from it. I seemed to draw of its strength when I was
tired, of its courage when I faltered. And, during those four days
of indecision in Louisville, it seemed to say to me in words that
I could not evade or forget, “Go to New Orleans.” It was a
sentiment — foolish, if you please — which could not resist. Nay,
which I did not try to resist, for I had little enough of it in my
life. What did it matter? I should never see Madame la Vicomtesse
d’Ivry-le-Tour.
She was Hélène to me; and the artist had caught the strength of
her soul in her clear-cut face, in the eyes that flashed with wit
and courage, — eyes that seemed to look with scorn upon what was
mean in the world and untrue, with pity on the weak. Here was one
who might have governed a province and still have been a woman,
one who had taken into exile the best of safeguards against
misfortune, — humor and an indomitable spirit.
CHAPTER V.
the house of the honeycombed tiles
AS LONG as I live I shall never forget that Sunday morning of my
second arrival at New Orleans. A saffron heat-haze hung over the
river and the city, robbed alike from the yellow waters of the one
and the pestilent moisture of the other. It would have been
strange indeed if this capital of Louisiana, brought hither to a
swamp from the sands of Biloxi many years ago by the energetic
Bienville, were not visited from time to time by the scourge!
Again I saw the green villas on the outskirts, the
verdure-dotted expanse of roofs of the city behind the levee bank,
the line of Kentucky boats, keel boats and barges which brought
our own resistless commerce hither in the teeth of royal mandates.
Farther out, and tugging fretfully in the yellow current, were the
aliens of the blue seas, high-hulled, their tracery of masts and
spars shimmering in the heat: a full-rigged ocean packet from
Spain, a barque and brigantine from the West Indies, a rakish
slaver from Africa with her water-line dry, discharged but
yesterday of a teeming horror of freight. I looked again upon the
familiar rows of trees which shaded the gravelled promenades where
Nick had first seen Antoinette. Then we were under it, for the
river was low, and the dingy-uniformed officer was bowing over our
passports beneath the awning. We walked ashore, Monsieur Vigo and
I, and we joined a staring group of keel boatmen and river-men
under the willows.
Below us, the white shell walks of the Place d’Armes were
thronged with gayly dressed people. Over their heads rose the fine
new Cathedral, built by the munificence of Don Andreas Almonaster,
and beside that the many-windowed, heavy-arched Cabildo, nearly
finished, which will stand for all time a monument to Spanish
builders.
“It is Corpus Christi day,” said Monsieur Vigo; "let us go and
see the procession.”
Here once more were the bright-turbaned negresses, the gay
Creole gowns and scarfs, the linen-jacketed, broad-hatted
merchants, with those of soberer and more conventional dress,
laughing and chatting, the children playing despite the heat. Many
of these people greeted Monsieur Vigo. There were the saturnine,
long-cloaked Spaniards, too, and a greater number than I had
believed of my own keen-faced countrymen lounging about, mildly
amused by the scene. We crossed the square, and with the courtesy
of their race the people made way for us in the press; and we were
no sooner placed ere the procession came out of the church.
Flaming soldiers of the Governor’s guard, two by two; sober,
sandalled friars in brown, priests in their robes, — another batch
of color; crosses shimmering, tapers emerging from the cool
darkness within to pale by the light of day. Then down on their
knees to Him who sits high above the yellow haze fell the
thousands in the Place d’Armes. For here was the Host itself,
flower-decked in white and crimson, its gold-tasselled canopy
upheld by four tonsured priests, a sheen of purple under it, — the
Bishop of Louisiana in his robes.
“The Governor!” whispered Monsieur Vigo, and the word was passed
from mouth to mouth as the people rose from their knees. Francois
Louis Hector, Baron de Carondelet, resplendent in his uniform of
colonel in the royal army of Spain, his orders glittering on his
breast, — pillar of royalty and enemy to the Rights of Man! His eye
was stern, his carriage erect, but I seemed to read in his
careworn face the trials of three years in this moist capital.
After the Governor, one by one, the waiting Associations fell in
line, each with its own distinguishing sash. So the procession
moved off into the narrow streets of the city, the people in the
Place dispersed to new vantage points, and Monsieur Vigo signed me
to follow him.
“I have a frien’, la veuve Gravois, who lives ver’ quiet. She
have one room, and I ask her tek you in, Davy.” He led the way
through the empty Rue Chartres, turned to the right at the Rue
Bienville, and stopped before an unpretentious house some three
doors from the corner. Madame Gravois, elderly, wizened, primp in
a starched cotton gown, opened the door herself, fell upon
Monsieur Vigo in the Creole fashion; and within a quarter of an
hour I was installed in her best room, which gave out on a little
court behind. Monsieur Vigo promised to send his servant with my
baggage, told me his address, bade me call on him for what I
wanted, and took his leave.
First, there was Madame Gravois’ story to listen to as she
bustled about giving orders to a kinky-haired negro girl
concerning my dinner. Then came the dinner, excellent — if I could
have eaten it. The virtues of the former Monsieur Gravois were
legion. He had come to Louisiana from Toulon, planted indigo,
fought a duel, and Madame was a widow. So I condense two hours
into two lines. Happily, Madame was not proof against the habits
of the climate, and she retired for her siesta. I sought my room,
almost suffocated by a heat which defies my pen to describe, a
heat reeking with moisture sucked from the foul kennels of the
city. I had felt nothing like it in my former visit to New
Orleans. It seemed to bear down upon my brain, to clog the power
of thought, to make me vacillating. Hitherto my reasoning had led
me to seek Monsieur de St. Gré, to count upon that gentleman’s
common sense and his former friendship. But now that the time had
come for it, I shrank from such a meeting. I remembered his
passionate affection for Antoinette, I imagined that he would not
listen calmly to one who was in some sort connected with her
unhappiness. So a kind of cowardice drove me first to Mrs. Temple.
She might know much that would save me useless trouble and
blundering.
The shadows of tree-top, thatch, and wall were lengthening as I
walked along the Rue Bourbon. Heedless of what the morrow might
bring forth, the street was given over to festivity. Merry groups
were gathered on the corners, songs and laughter mingled in the
court-yards, billiard balls clicked in the cabarets. A fat, jolly
little Frenchman, surrounded by tripping children, sat in his
doorway on the edge of the banquette, fiddling with all his might,
pausing only to wipe the beads of perspiration from his face.
“Madame Clive, mais oui, Monsieur, l’ petite maison en face.”
Smiling benignly at the children, he began to fiddle once more.
The little house opposite! Mrs. Temple, mistress of Temple Bow,
had come to this! It was a strange little home indeed, Spanish,
one-story, its dormers hidden by a honeycombed screen of
terra-cotta tiles. This screen was set on the extreme edge of the
roof which overhung the banquette and shaded the yellow adobe wall
of the house. Low, unpretentious, the latticed shutters of its two
windows giving it but a scant air of privacy, — indeed, they were
scarred by the raps of careless passers-by on the sidewalk. The
two little battened doors, one step up, were closed. I rapped,
waited, and rapped again. The musician across the street stopped
his fiddling, glanced at me, smiled knowingly at the children; and
they paused in their dance to stare. Then one of the doors was
pushed open a scant four inches, a scarlet madras handkerchief
appeared in the crack above a yellow face. There was a long moment
of silence, during which I felt the scrutiny of a pair of sharp,
black eyes.
“What yo’ want, Marse?”
The woman’s voice astonished me, for she spoke the dialect of
the American tide-water.
“I should like to see Mrs. Clive,” I answered.
The door closed a shade.
“Mistis sick, she ain’t see nobody,” said the woman. She closed
the door a little more, and I felt tempted to put my foot in the
crack.
“Tell her that Mr. David Ritchie is here,” I said.
There was an instant’s silence, then an exclamation.
“Lan’ sakes, is you Marse Dave?” She opened the door — furtively,
I thought — just wide enough for me to pass through. I found myself
in a low-ceiled, darkened room, opposite a trim negress who stood
with her arms akimbo and stared at me.
“Marse Dave, you doan rec’lect me. I’se Lindy, I’se Breed’s
daughter. I rec’lect you when you was at Temple Bow. Marse Dave,
how you’se done growed! Yassir, when I heerd from Miss Sally I
done comed here to tek cyar ob her.”
“How is your mistress?” I asked.
“She po’ly, Marse Dave,” said Lindy, and paused for adequate
words. I took note of this darky who, faithful to a family, had
come hither to share her mistress’s exile and obscurity. Lindy was
spare, energetic, forceful — and, I imagined, a discreet guardian
indeed for the unfortunate. "She po’ly, Marse Dave, an’ she ain’
nebber leabe dis year house. Marse Dave,” said Lindy earnestly,
lowering her voice and taking a step closer to me, “I done reckon
de Mistis gwine ter die ob lonesomeness. She des sit dar an’
brood, an’ brood — an’ she use’ ter de bes’ company, to de quality.
No, sirree, Marse Dave, she ain’ nebber sesso, but she tink ’bout
de young Marsa night an’ day. Marse Dave?”
“Yes?” I said.
“Marse Dave, she have a lil pink frock dat Marsa Nick had when
he was a bebby. I done cotch Mistis lookin’ at it, an’ she hid it
when she see me an’ blush like ’twas a sin. Marse Dave?”
“Yes?” I said again.
“Where am de young Marsa?”
“I don’t know, Lindy,” I answered.
Lindy sighed.
“She done talk ’bout you, Marse Dave, an’ how good you is — "
“And Mrs. Temple sees no one,” I asked.
“Dar’s one lady come hyar ebery week, er French lady, but she
speak English jes’ like the Mistis. Dat’s my fault,” said Lindy,
showing a line of white teeth.
“Your fault,” I exclaimed.
“Yassir. When I comed here from Caroliny de Mistis done tole me
not ter let er soul in hyah. One day erbout three mont’s ergo, dis
yer lady come en she des wheedled me ter let her in. She was de
quality, Marse Dave, and I was des’ afeard not ter. I declar’ I
hatter. Hush,” said Lindy, putting her fingers to her lips, “dar’s
de Mistis!”
The door into the back room opened, and Mrs. Temple stood on the
threshold, staring with uncertain eyes into the semi-darkness.
“Lindy,” she said, “what have you done?”
“Miss Sally — " Lindy began, and looked at me. But I could not
speak for looking at the lady in the doorway.
“Who is it?” she said again, and her hand sought the door-post
tremblingly. "Who is it?”
Then I went to her. At my first step she gave a little cry and
swayed, and had I not taken her in my arms I believe she would
have fallen.
“David!” she said, “David, is it you? I — I cannot see very well.
Why did you not speak?” She looked at Lindy and smiled. "It is
because I am an old woman, Lindy,” and she lifted her hand to her
forehead. "See, my hair is white — I shock you, David.”
Leaning on my shoulder, she led me through a little bedroom in
the rear into a tiny garden court beyond, a court teeming with
lavish colors and redolent with the scent of flowers. A white
shell walk divided the garden and ended at the door of a low
outbuilding, from the chimney of which blue smoke curled upward in
the evening air. Mrs. Temple drew me almost fiercely towards a
bench against the adobe wall.
“Where is he?” she said. "Where is he, David?”
The suddenness of the question staggered me; I hesitated.
“I do not know,” I answered.
I could not look into her face and say it. The years of torment
and suffering were written there in characters not to be mistaken.
Sarah Temple, the beauty, was dead indeed. The hope which
threatened to light again the dead fires in the woman’s eyes
frightened me.
“Ah,” she said sharply, “you are deceiving me. It is not like
you, David. You are deceiving me. Tell me, tell me, for the love
of God, who has brought me to bear chastisement.” And she gripped
my arm with a strength I had not thought in her.
“Listen,” I said, trying to calm myself as well as her. "Listen,
Mrs. Temple.” I could not bring myself to call her otherwise.
“You are keeping him away from me,” she cried. "Why are you
keeping him away? Have I not suffered enough? David, I cannot live
long. I do not dare to die — until he has forgiven me.”
I forced her, gently as I might, to sit on the bench, and I
seated myself beside her.
“Listen,” I said, with a sternness that hid my feelings, and
perforce her expression changed again to a sad yearning, “you must
hear me. And you must trust me, for I have never pretended. You
shall see him if it is in my power.”
She looked at me so piteously that I was near to being unmanned.
“I will trust you,” she whispered.
“I have seen him,” I said. She started violently, but I laid my
hand on hers, and by some self-mastery that was still in her she
was silent. "I saw him in Louisville a month ago, when I returned
from a year’s visit to Philadelphia.”
I could not equivocate with this woman, I could no more lie to
her sorrow than to the Judgment. Why had I not foreseen her
question?
“And he hates me?” She spoke with a calmness now that frightened
me more than her agitation had done.
“I do not know,” I answered; "when I would have spoken to him he
was gone.”
“He was drunk,” she said. I stared at her in frightened
wonderment. "He was drunk — it is better than if he had cursed me.
He did not mention me? Or any one?”
“He did not,” I answered.
She turned her face away.
“Go on, I will listen to you,” she said, and sat immovable
through the whole of my story, though her hand trembled in mine.
And while I live I hope never to have such a thing to go through
with again. Truth held me to the full, ludicrous tragedy of the
tale, to the cheap character of my old Colonel’s undertaking, to
the incident of the drum, to the conversation in my room.
Likewise, truth forbade me to rekindle her hope. I did not tell
her that Nick had come with St. Gré to New Orleans, for of this my
own knowledge was as yet not positive. For a long time after I had
finished she was silent.
“And you think the expedition will not get here?” she asked
finally, in a dead voice.
“I am positive of it,” I answered, “and for the sake of those
who are engaged in it, it is mercifully best that it should not.
The day may come,” I added, for the sake of leading her away,
"when Kentucky will be strong enough to overrun Louisiana. But not
now.”
She turned to me with a trace of her former fierceness.
“Why are you in New Orleans?” she demanded.
A sudden resolution came to me then.
“To bring you back with me to Kentucky,” I answered. She shook
her head sadly, but I continued: "I have more to say. I am
convinced that neither Nick nor you will be happy until you are
mother and son again. You have both been wanderers long enough.”
Once more she turned away and fell into a revery. Over the
housetop, from across the street, came the gay music of the
fiddler. Mrs. Temple laid her hand gently on my shoulder.
“My dear,” she said, smiling, “I could not live for the
journey.”
“You must live for it,” I answered. "You have the will. You must
live for it, for his sake.”
She shook her head, and smiled at me with a courage which was
the crown of her sufferings.
“You are talking nonsense, David,” she said; "it is not like
you. Come,” she said, rising with something of her old manner, “I
must show you what I have been doing all these years. You must
admire my garden.”
I followed her, marvelling, along the shell path, and there came
unbidden to my mind the garden at Temple Bow, where she had once
been wont to sit, tormenting Mr. Mason or bending to the tale of
Harry Riddle’s love. Little she cared for flowers in those days,
and now they had become her life. With such thoughts in my mind, I
listened unheeding to her talk. The place was formerly occupied by
a shiftless fellow, a tailor; and the court, now a paradise, had
been a rubbish heap. That orange tree which shaded the uneven
doorway of the kitchen she had found here. Figs, pomegranates,
magnolias; the camellias dazzling in their purity; the blood-red
oleanders; the pink roses that hid the crumbling adobe and climbed
even to the sloping tiles, — all these had been set out and cared
for with her own hands. Ay, and the fragrant bed of yellow jasmine
over which she lingered, — Antoinette’s favorite flower.
Antoinette’s flowers that she wore in her hair! In her letters
Mrs. Temple had never mentioned Antoinette, and now she read the
question (perchance purposely put there) in my eyes. Her voice
faltered sadly. Scarce a week had she been in the house before
Antoinette had found her.
“I — I sent the girl away, David. She came without Monsieur de St.
Gre’s knowledge, without his consent. It is natural that he thinks
me — I will not say what. I sent Antoinette away. She clung to me,
she would not go, and I had to be — cruel. It is one of the things
which make the nights long — so long. My sins have made her life
unhappy.”
“And you hear of her? She is not married?” I asked.
“No, she is not married,” said Mrs. Temple, stooping over the
jasmines. Then she straightened and faced me, her voice shaken
with earnestness. "David, do you think that Nick still loves her?”
Alas, I could not answer that. She bent over the jasmines again.
“There were five years that I knew nothing,” she continued. "I
did not dare ask Mr. Clark, who comes to me on business, as you
know. It was Mr. Clark who brought back Lindy on one of his trips
to Charleston. And then, one day in March of this year, Madame de
Montméry came.”
“Madame de Montméry?” I repeated.
“It is a strange story,” said Mrs. Temple. "Lindy had never
admitted any one, save Mr. Clark. One day early in the spring,
when I was trimming my roses by the wall there, the girl ran to me
and said that a lady wished to see me. Why had she let her in?
Lindy did not know, she could not refuse her. Had the lady
demanded admittance? Lindy thought that I would like to see her.
David, it was a providential weakness, or curiosity, that prompted
me to go into the front room, and then I saw why Lindy had opened
the door to her. Who she is or what she is I do not know to this
day. Who am I now that I should inquire? I know that she is a
lady, that she has exquisite manners, that I feel now that I
cannot live without her. She comes every week, sometimes twice,
she brings me little delicacies, new seeds for my garden. But,
best of all, she brings me herself, and I am always counting the
days until she comes again. Yes, and I always fear that she, too,
will be taken away from me.”
I had not heard the sound of voices, but Mrs. Temple turned,
startled, and looked towards the house. I followed her glance, and
suddenly I knew that my heart was beating.
STOPPED HERE
HESITATING on the step, a lady stood in the vine-covered
doorway, a study in black and white in a frame of pink roses. The
sash at her waist, the lace mantilla that clung about her throat,
the deftly coiled hair with its sheen of the night waters — these in
black. The simple gown — a tribute to the art of her countrywomen — in
white.
Mrs. Temple had gone forward to meet her, but I stood staring,
marvelling, forgetful, in the path. They were talking, they were
coming towards me, and I heard Mrs. Temple pronounce my name and
hers — Madame de Montméry. I bowed, she courtesied. There was a
baffling light in the lady’s brown eyes when I dared to glance at
them, and a smile playing around her mouth. Was there no word in
the two languages to find its way to my lips? Mrs. Temple laid her
hand on my arm.
“David is not what one might call a ladies’ man, Madame,” she
said.
The lady laughed.
“Isn’t he?” she said.
“I am sure you will frighten him with your wit,” answered Mrs.
Temple, smiling. "He is worth sparing.”
“He is worth frightening, then,” said the lady, in exquisite
English, and she looked at me again.
“You and David should like each other,” said Mrs. Temple; "you
are both capable persons, friends of the friendless and towers of
strength to the weak.”
The lady’s face became serious, but still there was the
expression I could not make out. In an instant she seemed to have
scrutinized me with a precision from which there could be no
appeal.
“I seem to know Mr. Ritchie,” she said, and added quickly: "Mrs.
Clive has talked a great deal about you. She has made you out a
very wonderful person.”
“My dear,” said Mrs. Temple, “the wonderful people of this world
are those who find time to comfort and help the unfortunate. That
is why you and David are wonderful. No one knows better than I how
easy it is to be selfish.”
“I have brought you an English novel,” said Madame de Montomery,
turning abruptly to Mrs. Temple. "But you must not read it at
night. Lindy is not to let you have it until to-morrow.”
“There,” said Mrs. Temple, gayly, to me, “Madame is not happy
unless she is controlling some one, and I am a rebellious
subject.”
“You have not been taking care of yourself,” Madame. She
glanced at me, and bit her lips, as though guessing the emotion
which my visit had caused. "Listen,” she said, “the vesper bells!
You must go into the house, and Mr. Ritchie and I must leave you.”
She took Mrs. Temple by the arm and led her, unresisting, along
the path. I followed, a thousand thoughts and conjectures spinning
in my brain. They reached the bench under the little tree beside
the door, and stood talking for a moment of the routine of Mrs.
Temple’s life. Madame, it seemed, had prescribed a regimen, and
meant to have it followed. Suddenly I saw Mrs. Temple take the
lady’s arm, and sink down upon the bench. Then we were both beside
her, bending over her, she sitting upright and smiling at us.
“It is nothing,” she said; "I am so easily tired.”
Her lips were ashen, and her breath came quickly. Madame acted
with that instant promptness which I expected of her.
“You must carry her in, Mr. Ritchie,” she said quietly.
“No, it is only momentary, David,” said Mrs. Temple. I remember
how pitifully frail and light she was as I picked her up and
followed Madame through the doorway into the little bedroom. I
laid Mrs. Temple on the bed.
“Send Lindy here,” said Madame.
Lindy was in the front room with the negress whom Madame had
brought with her. They were not talking. I supposed then this was
because Lindy did not speak French. I did not know that Madame de
Montméry’s maid was a mute. Both of them went into the bedroom,
and I was left alone. The door and windows were closed, and a
green myrtle-berry candle was burning on the table. I looked about
me with astonishment. But for the low ceiling and the wide cypress
puncheons of the floor the room might have been a boudoir in a
manor-house. On the slender-legged, polished mahogany table lay
books in tasteful bindings; a diamond-paned bookcase stood in the
corner; a fauteuil and various other chairs which might have come
from the hands of an Adam were ranged about. Tall silver
candlesticks graced each end of the little mantel-shelf, and
between them were two Lowestoft vases having the Temple coat of
arms.
It might have been half an hour that I waited, now pacing the
floor, now throwing myself into the arm-chair by the fireplace.
Anxiety for Mrs. Temple, problems that lost themselves in a dozen
conjectures, all idle — these agitated me almost beyond my power of
self-control. Once I felt for the miniature, took it out, and put
it back without looking at it. At last I was startled to my feet
by the opening of the door, and Madame de Montméry came in. She
closed the door softly behind her, with the deft quickness and
decision of movement which a sixth sense had told me she
possessed, crossed the room swiftly, and stood confronting me.
“She is easy again, now,” she said simply. "It is one of her
attacks. I wish you might have seen me before you told her what
you had to say to her.”
“I wish indeed that I had known you were here.”
She ignored this, whether intentionally, I know not.
“It is her heart, poor lady! I am afraid she cannot live long.”
She seated herself in one of the straight chairs. "Sit down, Mr.
Ritchie,” she said; "I am glad you waited. I wanted to talk with
you.”
“I thought that you might, Madame la Vicomtesse,” I answered.
She made no gesture, either of surprise or displeasure.
“So you knew,” she said quietly.
“I knew you the moment you appeared in the doorway,” I replied.
It was not just what I meant to say.
There flashed over her face that expression of the miniature,
the mouth repressing the laughter in the brown eyes.
“Montméry is one of my husband’s places,” she said. "When
Antoinette asked me to come here and watch over Mrs. Temple, I
chose the name.”
“And Mrs. Temple has never suspected you?”
“I think not. She thinks I came at Mr. Clark’s request. And
being a lady, she does not ask questions. She accepts me for what
I appear to be.”
It seemed so strange to me to be talking here in New Orleans, in
this little Spanish house, with a French vicomtesse brought up
near the court of the unfortunate Marie Antoinette; nay, with
Hélène de St. Gré, whose portrait had twice come into my life by a
kind of strange fatality (and was at that moment in my pocket),
that I could scarce maintain my self-possession in her presence. I
had given the portrait, too, attributes and a character, and I
found myself watching the lady with a breathless interest lest she
should fail in any of these. In the intimacy of the little room I
felt as if I had known her always, and again, that she was as
distant from me and my life as the court from which she had come.
I found myself glancing continually at her face, on which the
candle-light shone. The Vicomtesse might have been four and
twenty. Save for the soberer gown she wore, she seemed scarce
older than the young girl in the miniature who had the presence of
a woman of the world. Suddenly I discovered with a flush that she
was looking at me intently, without embarrassment, but with an
expression that seemed to hint of humor in the situation. To my
astonishment, she laughed a little.
“You are a very odd person, Mr. Ritchie,” she said. "I have
heard so much of you from Mrs. Temple, from Antoinette, that I
know something of your strange life. After all,” she added with a
trace of sadness, “it has been no stranger than my own. First I
will answer your questions, and then I shall ask some.”
“But I have asked no questions, Madame la Vicomtesse,” I said.
“And you are a very simple person, Mr. Ritchie,” continued
Madame la Vicomtesse, smiling; "it is what I had been led to
suppose. A serious person. As the friend of Mr. Nicholas Temple,
as the relation and (may I say?) benefactor of this poor lady
here, it is fitting that you should know certain things. I will
not weary you with the reasons and events which led to my coming
from Europe to New Orleans, except to say that I, like all of my
class who have escaped the horrors of the Revolution, am a
wanderer, and grateful to Monsieur de St. Gré for the shelter he
gives me. His letter reached me in England, and I arrived three
months ago.”
She hesitated — nay, I should rather say paused, for there was
little hesitation in what she did. She paused, as though weighing
what she was to say next.
“When I came to Les Iles I saw that there was a sorrow weighing
upon the family; and it took no great astuteness on my part, Mr.
Ritchie, to discover that Antoinette was the cause of it. One has
only to see Antoinette to love her. I wondered why she had not
married. And yet I saw that there had been an affair. It seemed
very strange to me, Mr. Ritchie, for with us, you understand,
marriages are arranged. Antoinette really has beauty, she is the
daughter of a man of importance in the colony, her strength of
character saves her from being listless. I found a girl with
originality of expression, with a sense of the fitness of things,
devoted to charitable works, who had not taken the veil. That was
on her father’s account. As you know, they are inseparable.
Monsieur Philippe de St. Gré is a remarkable man, with certain
vigorous ideas not in accordance with the customs of his
neighbors. It was he who first confided in me that he would not
force Antoinette to marry; it was she, at length, who told me the
story of Nicholas Temple and his mother.” She paused again, and,
reading between the lines, I perceived that Madame la Vicomtesse
had become essential to the household at Les Iles. Philippe de St.
Gre was not a man to misplace a confidence.
“It was then that I first heard of you, Mr. Ritchie, and of the
part which you played in that affair. It was then I had my first
real insight into Antoinette’s character. Her affection for Mrs.
Temple astonished me, bewildered me. The woman had deceived her
and her family, and yet Antoinette gave up her lover because he
would not take his mother back. Had Mrs. Temple been willing to
return to Les Iles after you had providentially taken her away,
they would have received her. Philippe de St. Gré is not a man to
listen to criticism. As it was, Antoinette did not rest until she
found where Mrs. Temple had hidden herself, and then she came here
to her. It is not for us to judge any of them. In sending
Antoinette away the poor lady denied herself the only consolation
that was left to her. Antoinette understood. Every week she has
had news of Mrs. Temple from Mr. Clark. And when I came and
learned her trouble, Antoinette begged me to come here and be Mrs.
Temple’s friend. Mr. Ritchie, she is a very ill woman and a very
sad woman, — the saddest woman I have ever known, and I have seen
many.”
“And Mademoiselle de St. Gré?” I asked.
“Tell me about this man for whom Antoinette has ruined her
life,” said Madame la Vicomtesse, brusquely. "Is he worth it? No,
no man is worth what she has suffered. What has become of him?
Where is he? Did you not tell her that you would bring him back?”
“I said that I would bring him back if I could,” I answered,
"and I meant it, Madame.”
Madame la Vicomtesse bit her lip. Had she known me better, she
might have smiled. As for me, I was wholly puzzled to account for
these fleeting changes in her humor.
“You have taken a great deal upon your shoulders, Mr. Ritchie,”
she said. "They are from all accounts broad ones. There, I was
wrong to be indignant in your presence, — you who seem to have spent
your life in trying to get others out of difficulties. Mercy,” she
said, with a quick gesture at my protest, “there are few men with
whom one might talk thus in so short an acquaintance. I love the
girl, and I cannot help being angry with Mr. Temple. I suppose
there is something to be said on his side. Let us hear it — I dare
say he could not have a better advocate,” she finished, with an
indefinable smile.
I began at the wrong end of my narrative, and it was some time
before I had my facts arranged in proper sequence. I could not
forget that Madame la Vicomtesse was looking at me fixedly. I
reviewed Nick’s neglected childhood; painted as well as I might
his temperament and character — his generosity and fearlessness, his
recklessness and improvidence. His loyalty to those he loved, his
detestation of those he hated. I told how, under these conditions,
the sins and vagaries of his parents had gone far to wreck his
life at the beginning of it. I told how I had found him again with
Sevier, how he had come to New Orleans with me the first time, how
he had loved Antoinette, and how he had disappeared after the
dreadful scene in the garden at Les Iles, how I had not seen him
again for five years. Here I hesitated, little knowing how to tell
the Vicomtesse of that affair in Louisville. Though I had a sense
that I could not keep the truth from so discerning a person, I was
startled to find this to be so.
“Yes, yes, I understand,” she said quickly. "And in the morning
he had flown with that most worthy of my relatives, Auguste de St.
Gre.”
I looked at her, finding no words to express my astonishment at
this perspicacity.
“And now what do you intend to do?” she asked. "Find him in New
Orleans, if you can, of course. But how?” She rose quickly, went
to the fireplace, and stood for a moment with her back to me.
Suddenly she turned. "It ought not to be difficult, after all.
Auguste de St. Gré is a fool, and he confirms what you say of the
expedition. He is, indeed, a pretty person to choose for an
intrigue of this kind. And your cousin, — what shall we call him?”
“To say the least, secrecy is not Nick’s forte,” I answered,
catching her mood.
She was silent awhile.
“It would be a blessing if Monsieur le Baron could hang Auguste
privately. As for your cousin, he may be worth saving, after all.
I know Monsieur de Carondelet, and he has no patience with
conspirators of this sort. I think he would not hesitate to make
examples of them. However, we will try to save them.”
“We!” I repeated unwittingly.
Madame la Vicomtesse looked at me and laughed out right.
“Yes,” she said, “you will do some things, I others. There are
the gaming clubs with their ridiculous names, L’Amour, La
Mignonne, La Désirée” (she counted them reflectively on her
fingers). "Both of our gentlemen might be tempted into one of
these. You will drop into them, Mr. Ritchie. Then there is Madame
Bouvet’s.”
“Auguste would scarcely go there,” I objected.
“Ah,” said Madame la Vicomtesse, “but Madame Bouvet will know
the names of some of Auguste’s intimates. This Bouvet is evidently
a good person, perhaps she will do more for you. I understand that
she has a weak spot in her heart for Auguste.”
Madame la Vicomtesse turned her back again. Had she heard how
Madame Bouvet had begged me to buy the miniature?
“Have you any other suggestions to make?” she said, putting a
foot on the fender.
“They have all been yours, so far,” I answered.
“And yet you are a man of action, of expedients,” she murmured,
without turning. "Where are your wits, Mr. Ritchie? Have you any
plan?”
“I have been so used to rely on myself, Madame,” I replied.
“That you do not like to have your affairs meddled with by a
woman,” she said, into the fireplace.
“I give you the credit to believe that you are too clever to
misunderstand me, Madame,” I said. "You must know that your help
is most welcome.”
At that she swung around and regarded me strangely, mirth
lurking in her eyes. She seemed about to retort, and then to
conquer the impulse. The effect of this was to make me anything
but self-complacent. She sat down in the chair and for a little
while she was silent.
“Suppose we do find them,” she said suddenly. "What shall we do
with them?” She looked up at me questioningly, seriously. "Is it
likely that your Mr. Temple will be reconciled with his mother? Is
it likely that he is still in love with Antoinette?”
“I think it is likely that he is still in love with Mademoiselle
de St. Gré,” I answered, “though I have no reason for saying so.”
“You are very honest, Mr. Ritchie. We must look at this problem
from all sides. If he is not reconciled with his mother,
Antoinette will not receive him. And if he is, we have the
question to consider whether he is still worthy of her. The agents
of Providence must not be heedless,” she added with a smile.
“I am sure that Nick would alter his life if it became worth
living,” I said. "I will answer for that much.”
“Then he must be reconciled with his mother,” she replied with
decision. "Mrs. Temple has suffered enough. And he must be found
before he gets sufficiently into the bad graces of the Baron de
Carondelet, — these two things are clear.” She rose. "Come here
to-morrow evening at the same time.”
She started quickly for the bedroom door, but something troubled
me still.
“Madame — " I said.
“Yes,” she answered, turning quickly.
I did not know how to begin. There were many things I wished to
say, to know, but she was a woman whose mind seemed to leap the
chasms, whose words touched only upon those points which might not
be understood. She regarded me with seeming patience.
“I should think that Mrs. Temple might have recognized you,” I
said, for want of a better opening.
“From the miniature?” she said.
I flushed furiously, and it seemed to burn me through the lining
of my pocket.
“That was my salvation,” she said. "Mrs. Temple has never seen
the miniature. I have heard how you rescued it, Mr. Ritchie,” she
added, with a curious smile. "Monsieur Philippe de St. Gré told
me.”
“Then he knew?” I stammered.
She laughed.
“I have told you that you are a very simple person,” she said.
"Even you are not given to intrigues. I thank you for rescuing
me.”
I flushed more hotly than before.
“I never expected to see you,” I said.
“It must have been a shock,” she said.
I was dumb. I had my hand in my coat; I fully intended to give
her the miniature. It was my plain duty. And suddenly,
overwhelmed, I remembered that it was wrapped in Polly Ann’s silk
handkerchief.
Madame la Vicomtesse remained for a moment where she was.
“Do not do anything until the morning,” she said. "You must go
back to your lodgings at once.”
“That would be to lose time,” I answered.
“You must think of yourself a little,” she said. "Do as I say. I
have heard that two cases of the yellow fever have broken out this
afternoon. And you, who are not used to the climate, must not be
out after dark.”
“And you?” I said.
“I am used to it,” she replied; "I have been here three months.
Lest anything should happen, it might be well for you to give me
your address.”
“I am with Madame Gravois, in the Rue Bienville.”
“Madame Gravois, in the Rue Bienville,” she repeated. “I shall
remember. À demain, Monsieur.” She courtesied and went swiftly
into Mrs. Temple’s room. Seizing my hat, I opened the door and
found myself in the dark street.
CHAPTER VII.
the disposal of the sieur de St. Gré
I HAD met Hélène de St. Gré at last. And what a fool she must
think me! As I hurried along the dark banquettes this thought
filled my brain for a time to the exclusion of all others, so
strongly is vanity ingrained in us. After all, what did it matter
what she thought, — Madame la Vicomtesse d’Ivry-le-Tour? I had never
shone, and it was rather late to begin. But I possessed, at least,
average common sense, and I had given no proof even of this.
I wandered on, not heeding the command which she had given
me, — to go home. The scent of camellias and magnolias floated on
the heavy air of the night from the court-yards, reminding me of
her. Laughter and soft voices came from the galleries. Despite the
Terror, despite the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, despite the Rights of
Man and the wars and suffering arising therefrom, despite the
scourge which might come to-morrow, life went gayly on. The
cabarets echoed, and behind the tight blinds lines of light showed
where the Creole gentry gamed at their tables, perchance in the
very clubs Madame la Vicomtesse had mentioned.
The moon, in her first quarter, floated in a haze. Washed by her
light, the quaintly wrought balconies and heavy-tiled roofs of the
Spanish buildings, risen from the charred embers, took on a touch
of romance. I paused once with a twinge of remembrance before the
long line of the Ursuline convent, with its latticed belfry
against the sky. There was the lodge, with its iron gates shut,
and the wall which Nick had threatened to climb. As I passed the
great square of the new barracks, a sereno (so the night watchmen
were called) was crying the hour. I came to the rambling
market-stalls, casting black shadows on the river road, — empty now,
to be filled in the morning with shouting marchands. The promenade
under the willows was deserted, the great river stretched away
under the moon towards the forest line of the farther shore, filmy
and indistinct. A black wisp of smoke rose from the gunwale of a
flatboat, and I stopped to listen to the weird song of a negro,
which I have heard many times since.
Gaining the promenade, I came presently to the new hotel which
had been built for the Governor, with its balconied windows
looking across the river — the mansion of Monsieur le Baron de
Carondelet. Even as I sat on the bench in the shadow of the
willows, watching the sentry who paced before the arched entrance,
I caught sight of a man stealing along the banquette on the other
side of the road. Twice he paused to look behind him, and when he
reached the corner of the street he stopped for some time to
survey the Governor’s house opposite.
Suddenly I was on my feet, every sense alert, staring. In the
moonlight, made milky by the haze, he was indistinct. And yet I
could have taken oath that the square, diminutive figure, with the
head set forward on the shoulders, was Gignoux’s. If this man were
not Gignoux, then the Lord had cast two in a strange mould.
And what was Gignoux doing in New Orleans? As if in answer to
the question two men emerged from the dark archway of the
Governor’s house, passed the sentry, and stood for an instant on
the edge of the shadow. One wore a long Spanish cloak, and the
other a uniform that I could not make out. A word was spoken, and
then my man was ambling across to meet them, and the three walked
away up Toulouse Street.
I was in a fire of conjecture. I did not dare to pass the sentry
and follow them, so I made round as fast as I could by the Rue St.
Pierre, which borders the Place d’Armes, and then crossed to
Toulouse again by Chartres. The three were nowhere to be seen. I
paused on the corner for thought, and at length came to a
reluctant but prudent conclusion that I had best go back to my
lodging and seek Monsieur early in the morning.
Madame Gravois was awaiting me. Was Monsieur mad to remain out
at night? Had Monsieur not heard of the yellow fever? Madame
Gravois even had prepared some concoction which she poured out of
a bottle, and which I took with the docility of a child. Monsieur
Vigo had called, and there was a note. A note? It was a small
note. I glanced stupidly at the seal, recognized the swan of the
St. Gré crest, broke it, and read: —
“Mr. Ritchie will confer a favor upon la Vicomtesse
d’Ivry-le-Tour if he will come to Monsieur de St. Gré’s house at
eight to-morrow morning.”
I bade the reluctant Madame Gravois good night, gained my room,
threw off my clothes, and covered myself with the mosquito bar.
There was no question of sleep, for the events of the day and
surmises for the morrow tortured me as I tossed in the heat. Had
the man been Gignoux? If so, he was in league with Carondelet’s
police. I believed him fully capable of this. And if he knew
Nick’s whereabouts and St. Gré’s, they would both be behind the
iron gateway of the calabozo in the morning. Monsieur Vigo had
pointed out to me that day the gloomy, heavy-walled prison in the
rear of the Cabildo, — ay, and he had spoken of its instruments of
torture.
What could the Vicomtesse want? Truly (I thought with remorse)
she had been more industrious than I.
I fell at length into a fevered sleep, and awoke, athirst, with
the light trickling through my lattices. Contrary to Madame
Gravois’s orders, I had opened the glass of my window. Glancing at
my watch, — which I had bought in Philadelphia, — I saw that the hands
pointed to half after seven. I had scarcely finished my toilet
before there was a knock at the door, and Madame Gravois entered
with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and her bottle of
medicine in the other.
“I did not wake Monsieur,” she said, “for he was tired.”
She gave me another dose of the medicine, made me drink two cups
of coffee, and then I started out with all despatch for the House
of the Lions. As I turned into the Rue Chartres I saw ahead of me
four horses, with their bridles bunched and held by a negro lad,
waiting in the street. Yes, they were in front of the house. There
it was, with its solid green gates between the lions, its yellow
walls with the fringe of peeping magnolias and oranges, with its
green-latticed gallery from which Monsieur Auguste had let himself
down after stealing the miniature. I knocked at the wicket, the
same gardienne answered the call, smiled, led me through the cool,
paved archway which held in its frame the green of the court
beyond, and up the stairs with the quaint balustrade which I had
mounted five years before to meet Philippe de St. Gré. As I
reached the gallery Madame la Vicomtesse, gowned in brown linen
for riding, rose quickly from her chair and came forward to meet
me.
“You have news?” I asked, as I took her hand.
“I have the kind of news I expected,” she answered, a smile
tempering the gravity of her face; "Auguste is, as usual, in need
of money.”
“Then you have found them,” I answered, my voice betraying my
admiration for the feat.
Madame la Vicomtesse shrugged her shoulders slightly.
“I did nothing,” she said. "From what you told me, I suspected
that as soon as Auguste reached Louisiana he would have a strong
desire to go away again. This is undoubtedly what has happened. In
any event, I knew that he would want money, and that he would
apply to a source which has hitherto never failed him.”
“Mademoiselle Antoinette!” I said.
“Precisely,” answered Madame la Vicomtesse. "When I reached home
last night I questioned Antoinette, and I discovered that by a
singular chance a message from Auguste had already reached her.”
“Where is he?” I demanded.
“I do not know,” she replied. "But he will be behind the hedge
of the garden at Les Iles at eleven o’clock — unless he has lost
before then his love of money.”
“Which is to say — "
“He will be there unless he is dead. That is why I sent for you,
Monsieur.” She glanced at me. "Sometimes it is convenient to have
a man.”
I was astounded. Then I smiled, the affair was so ridiculously
simple.
“And Monsieur de St. Gré?” I asked.
“Has been gone for a week with Madame to visit the estimable
Monsieur Poydras at Pointe Coupee.” Madame la Vicomtesse, who had
better use for her words than to waste them at such a time, left
me, went to the balcony, and began to give the gardienne in the
court below swift directions in French. Then she turned to me
again.
“Are you prepared to ride with Antoinette and me to Les Iles,
Monsieur?” she asked.
“I am,” I answered.
It must have been my readiness that made her smile. Then her
eyes rested on mine.
“You look tired, Mr. Ritchie,” she said. "You did not obey me
and go home last night.”
“How did you know that?” I asked, with a thrill at her interest.
“Because Madame Gravois told my messenger that you were out.”
I was silent.
“You must take care of yourself,” she said briefly. "Come, there
are some things which I wish to say to you before Antoinette is
ready.”
She led me toward the end of the gallery, where a bright screen
of morning-glories shaded us from the sun. But we had scarce
reached the place ere the sound of steps made us turn, and there
was Mademoiselle Antoinette herself facing us. I went forward a
few steps, hesitated, and bowed. She courtesied, my name faltering
on her lips. Yes, it was Antoinette, not the light-hearted girl
whom we had heard singing “Ma luron”
in the garden, but a woman
now with a strange beauty that astonished me. Hers was the dignity
that comes from unselfish service, the calm that is far from
resignation, though the black veil caught up on her chapeau de
paille gave her the air of a Sister of Mercy. Antoinette had
inherited the energies as well as the features of the St. Gré’s,
yet there was a painful moment as she stood there, striving to put
down the agitation the sight of me gave her. As for me, I was
bereft of speech, not knowing what to say or how far to go. My
last thought was of the remarkable quality in this woman before me
which had held her true to Mrs. Temple, and which sent her so
courageously to her duty now.
Madame la Vicomtesse, as I had hoped, relieved the situation.
She knew how to broach a dreaded subject.
“Mr. Ritchie is going with us, Antoinette,” she said.
“It is perhaps best to explain everything to him before we
start. I was about to tell you, Mr. Ritchie,” she continued,
turning to me, “that Auguste has given no hint in his note of Mr.
Temple’s presence in Louisiana. And yet you told me that they were
to have come here together.”
“Yes,” I answered, “and I have no reason to think they have
separated.”
“I was merely going to suggest,” said the Vicomtesse, firmly, “I
was merely going to suggest the possibility of our meeting Mr.
Temple with Auguste.”
It was Antoinette who answered, with a force that revealed a new
side of her character.
“Mr. Temple will not be there,” she said, flashing a glance upon
us. "Do you think he would come to me — ?”
Hélène laid her hand upon the girl’s arm.
“My dear, I think nothing,” she said quietly; "but it is best
for us to be prepared against any surprise. Remember that I do not
know Mr. Temple, and that you have not seen him for five years.”
“It is not like him, you know it is not like him,” exclaimed
Antoinette, looking at me.
“I know it is not like him, Mademoiselle,” I replied.
Madame la Vicomtesse, from behind the girl, gave me a
significant look.
“This occurred to me,” she went on in an undisturbed tone, “that
Mr. Temple might come with Auguste to protest against the
proceeding, — or even to defend himself against the imputation that
he was to make use of this money in any way. I wish you to
realize, Antoinette, before you decide to go, that you may meet
Mr. Temple. Would it not be better to let Mr. Ritchie go alone? I
am sure that we could find no better emissary.”
“Auguste is here,” said Antoinette. "I must see him.” Her voice
caught. "I may never see him again. He may be ill, he may be
starving — and I know that he is in trouble. Whether" (her voice
caught) "whether Mr. Temple is with him or not, I mean to go.”
“Then it would be well to start,” said the Vicomtesse.
Deftly dropping her veil, she picked up a riding whip that lay
on the railing and descended the stairs to the courtyard.
Antoinette and I followed. As we came through the archway I saw
Andreacute;, Monsieur de St. Gré’s mulatto, holding open the wicket for
us to pass. He helped the ladies to mount the ponies, lengthened
my own stirrups for me, swung into the saddle himself, and then
the four of us were picking our way down the Rue Chartres at an
easy amble. Turning to the right beyond the cool garden of the
Ursulines, past the yellow barracks, we came to the river front
beside the fortifications. A score of negroes were sweating there
in the sun, swinging into position the long logs for the
palisades, nearly completed. They were like those of Kaskaskia and
our own frontier forts in Kentucky, with a forty-foot ditch in
front of them. Seated on a horse talking to the overseer was a fat
little man in white linen who pulled off his hat and bowed
profoundly to the ladies. His face gave me a start, and then I
remembered that I had seen him only the day before, resplendent,
coming out of church. He was the Baron de Carondelet.
There was a sentry standing under a crape-myrtle where the Royal
Road ran through the gateway. Behind him was a diminutive
five-sided brick fort with a dozen little cannon on top of it. The
sentry came forward, brought his musket to a salute, and halted
before my horse.
“You will have to show your passport,” murmured Madame la
Vicomtesse.
I drew the document from my pocket. It was signed by De Lemos,
and duly countersigned by the officer of the port. The man bowed,
and I passed on.
It was a strange, silent ride through the stinging heat to Les
Iles, the brown dust hanging behind us like a cloud, to settle
slowly on the wayside shrubbery. Across the levee bank the river
was low, listless, giving off hot breath like a monster in
distress. The forest pools were cracked and dry, the Spanish moss
was a haggard gray, and under the sun was the haze which covered
the land like a saffron mantle. At times a listlessness came over
me such as I had never known, to make me forget the presence of
the women at my side, the very errand on which we rode. From time
to time I was roused into admiration of the horsemanship of Madame
la Vicomtesse, for the restive Texas pony which she rode was stung
to madness by the flies. As for Antoinette, she glanced neither
right nor left through her veil, but rode unmindful of the way,
heedless of heat and discomfort, erect, motionless save for the
easy gait of her horse. At length we turned into the avenue
through the forest, lined by wild orange trees, came in sight of
the low, belvedered plantation house, and drew rein at the foot of
the steps. Antoinette was the first to dismount, and passed in
silence through the group of surprised house servants gathering at
the door. I assisted the Vicomtesse, who paused to bid the negroes
disperse, and we lingered for a moment on the gallery together.
“Poor Antoinette!” she said, “I wish we might have saved her
this.” She looked up at me. "How she defended him!” she exclaimed.
“She loves him,” I answered.
Madame la Vicomtesse sighed.
“I suppose there is no help for it,” she said. "But it is very
difficult not to be angry with Mr. Temple. The girl cared for his
mother, gave her a home, clung to her when he and the world would
have cast her off, sacrificed her happiness for them both. If I
see him, I believe I shall shake him. And if he doesn’t fall down
on his knees to her, I shall ask the Baron to hang him. We must
bring him to his senses, Mr. Ritchie. He must not leave Louisiana
until he sees her. Then he will marry her.” She paused,
scrutinized me in her quick way, and added: "You see that I take
your estimation of his character. You ought to be flattered.”
“I am flattered by any confidence you repose in me, Madame la
Vicomtesse.”
She laughed. I was not flattered then, but cursed myself for the
quaint awkwardness in my speech that amused her. And she was
astonishingly quick to perceive my moods.
“There, don’t be angry. You will never be a courtier, my honest
friend, and you may thank God for it. How sweet the shrubs are!
Your chief business in life seems to be getting people out of
trouble, and I am going to help you with this case.”
It was my turn to laugh.
“You are going to help!” I exclaimed. "My services have been
heavy, so far.”
“You should not walk around at night,” she replied irrelevantly.
Suddenly I remembered Gignoux, but even as I was about to tell
her of the incident Antoinette appeared in the doorway. She was
very pale, but her lips were set with excitement and her eyes
shone strangely. She was still in her riding gown, in her hand she
carried a leather bag, and behind her stood Andreacute; with a bundle.
“Quick!” she said; "we are wasting time, and he may be gone.”
Checking an exclamation which could hardly have been
complimentary to Auguste, the Vicomtesse crossed quickly to her
and put her arm about her.
“We will follow you, mignonne,” she said in French.
“Must you come?” said Antoinette, appealingly. "He may not
appear if he sees any one.”
“We shall have to risk that,” said the Vicomtesse, dryly, with a
glance at me. "You shall not go alone, but we will wait a few
moments at the hedge.”
We took the well-remembered way through the golden green light
under the trees, Antoinette leading, and the sight of the garden
brought back to me poignantly the scene in the moonlight with Mrs.
Temple. There was no sound save the languid morning notes of the
birds and the humming of the bees among the flowers as Antoinette
went tremblingly down the path and paused, listening, under the
branches of that oak where I had first beheld her. Then, with a
little cry, we saw her run forward — into the arms of Auguste de St.
Gre. It was a pitiful thing to look upon.
Antoinette had led her brother to the seat under the oak. How
long we waited I know not, but at length we heard their voices
raised, and without more ado Madame la Vicomtesse, beckoning me,
passed quickly through the gap in the hedge and went towards them.
I followed with Andreacute;. Auguste rose with an oath, and then stood
facing his cousin like a man struck dumb, his hands dropped. He
was a sorry sight indeed, unshaven, unkempt, dark circles under
his eyes, clothes torn.
“Hélène! You here — in America!” he cried in French, staring at
her.
“Yes, Auguste,” she replied quite simply, “I am here.” He would
have come towards her, but there was a note in her voice which
arrested him.
“And Monsieur le Vicomte — Henri?” he said. I found myself
listening tensely for the answer.
“Henri is in Austria, fighting for his King, I hope,” said
Madame la Vicomtesse.
“So Madame la Vicomtesse is a refugee,” he said with a bow and a
smile that made me very angry.
“And Monsieur de St. Gré!” I asked.
At the sound of my voice he started and gave back, for he had
not perceived me. He recovered his balance, such as it was,
instantly.
“Monsieur seems to take an extraordinary interest in my
affairs,” he said jauntily.
“Only when they are to the detriment of other persons who are my
friends,” I said.
“Monsieur has intruded in a family matter,” said Auguste,
grandly, still in French.
“By invitation of those most concerned, Monsieur,” I answered,
for I could have throttled him.
Auguste had developed. He had learned well that effrontery is
often the best weapon of an adventurer. He turned from me
disdainfully, petulantly, and addressed the Vicomtesse once more.
“I wish to be alone with Antoinette,” he said.
“No doubt,” said the Vicomtesse.
“I demand it,” said Auguste.
“The demand is not granted,” said the Vicomtesse; "that is why
we have come. Your sister has already made enough sacrifices for
you. I know you, Monsieur Auguste de St. Gré,” she continued with
quiet contempt. "It is not for love of Antoinette that you have
sought this meeting. It is because,” she said, riding down a
torrent of words which began to escape from him, “it is because
you are in a predicament, as usual, and you need money.”
It was Antoinette who spoke. She had risen, and was standing
behind Auguste. She still held the leather bag in her hand.
“Perhaps the sum is not enough,” she said; "he has to get to
France. Perhaps we could borrow more until my father comes home.”
She looked questioningly at us.
Madame la Vicomtesse was truly a woman of decision. Without more
ado she took the bag from Antoinette’s unresisting hands and put
it into mine. I was no less astonished than the rest of them.
“Mr. Ritchie will keep this until the negotiations are
finished,” said the Vicomtesse.
“Negotiations!” cried Auguste, beside himself. "This is
insolence, Madame.”
“Be careful, sir,” I said.
“Auguste!” cried Antoinette, putting her hand on his arm.
“Why did you tell them?” he demanded, turning on her.
“Because I trust them, Auguste,” Antoinette answered. She spoke
without anger, as one whose sorrow has put her beyond it. Her
speech had a dignity and force which might have awed a worthier
man. His disappointment and chagrin brought him beyond bounds.
“You trust them!” he cried, “you trust them when they tell you
to give your brother, who is starving and in peril of his life,
eight hundred livres? Eight hundred livres, pardieu, and your
brother!”
“It is all I have, Auguste,” said his sister, sadly.
“Ha!” he said dramatically, “I see, they seek my destruction.
This man" — pointing at me — "is a Federalist, and Madame la
Vicomtesse" — he bowed ironically — "is a Royalist.”
“Pish!” said the Vicomtesse, impatiently, “it would be an easy
matter to have you sent to the Morro — a word to Monsieur de
Carondelet, Auguste. Do you believe for a moment that, in your
father’s absence, I would have allowed Antoinette to come here
alone? And it was a happy circumstance that I could call on such a
man as Mr. Ritchie to come with us.”
“It seems to me that Mr. Ritchie and his friends have already
brought sufficient misfortune on the family.”
It was a villanous speech. Antoinette turned away, her shoulders
quivering, and I took a step towards him; but Madame la Vicomtesse
made a swift gesture, and I stopped, I know not why. She gave an
exclamation so sharp that he flinched physically, as though he had
been struck. But it was characteristic of her that when she began
to speak, her words cut rather than lashed.
“Auguste de St. Gré,” she said, “I know you. The Tribunal is
merciful compared to you. There is no one on earth whom you would
not torture for your selfish ends, no one whom you would not sell
without compunction for your pleasure. There are things that a
woman should not mention, and yet I would tell them without shame
to your face were it not for your sister. If it were not for her,
I would not have you in my presence. Shall I speak of your career
in France? There is Valenciennes, for example — "
She stopped abruptly. The man was gray, but not on his account
did the Vicomtesse stay her speech. She forgot him as though he
did not exist, and by one of those swift transitions which
thrilled me had gone to the sobbing Antoinette and taken her in
her arms, murmuring endearments of which our language is not
capable. I, too, forgot Auguste. But no rebuke, however stinging,
could make him forget himself, and before we realized it he was
talking again. He had changed his tactics.
“This is my home,” he said, “where I might expect shelter and
comfort. You make me an outcast.”
Antoinette disengaged herself from Hélène with a cry, but he
turned away from her and shrugged.
“A stranger would have fared better. Perhaps you will have more
consideration for a stranger. There is a French ship at the Terre
aux Bœufs in the English Turn, which sails to-night. I appeal to
you, Mr. Ritchie,” — he was still talking in French — “I appeal to
you, who are a man of affairs,” — and he swept me a bow, — “if a
captain would risk taking a fugitive to France for eight hundred
livres? Pardieu, I could get no farther than the Balize for that.
Monsieur,” he added meaningly, “you have an interest in this.
There are two of us to go.”
The amazing effrontery of this move made me gasp. Yet it was
neither the Vicomtesse nor myself who answered him. We turned by
common impulse to Antoinette, and she was changed. Her breath came
quickly, her eyes flashed, her anger made her magnificent.
“It is not true,” she cried, “you know it is not true.”
He lifted his shoulders and smiled.
“You are my brother, and I am ashamed to acknowledge you. I was
willing to give my last sou, to sell my belongings, to take from
the poor to help you — until you defamed a good man. You cannot make
me believe,” she cried, unheeding the color that surged into her
cheeks, “you cannot make me believe that he would use this money.
You cannot make me believe it.”
“Let us do him the credit of thinking that he means to repay
it,” said Auguste.
Antoinette’s eyes filled with tears, — tears of pride, of
humiliation, ay, and of an anger of which I had not thought her
capable. She was indeed a superb creature then, a personage I had
not imagined. Gathering up her gown, she passed Auguste and turned
on him swiftly.
“If you were to bring that to him,” she said, pointing to the
bag in my hand, “he would not so much as touch it. To-morrow I
shall go to the Ursulines, and I thank God I shall never see you
again. I thank God I shall no longer be your sister. Give Monsieur
the bundle,” she said to the frightened Andreacute;, who still stood by
the hedge; "he may need food and clothes for his journey.”
She left us. We stood watching her until her gown had
disappeared amongst the foliage. Andreacute; came forward and held out
the bundle to Auguste, who took it mechanically. Then Madame La
Vicomtesse motioned to Andreacute; to leave, and gave me a glance, and
it was part of the deep understanding of her I had that I took its
meaning. I had my forebodings at what this last conversation with
Auguste might bring forth, and I wished heartily that we were rid
of him.
“Monsieur de St. Gré,” I said, “I understood you to say that a
ship is lying at the English Turn some five leagues below us, on
which you are to take passage at once.”
He turned and glared at me, some devilish retort on his lips
which he held back. Suddenly he became suave.
“I shall want two thousand livres Monsieur; it was the sum I
asked for.”
“It is not a question of what you asked for,” I answered.
“Since when did Monsieur assume this intimate position in my
family?” he said, glancing at the Vicomtesse.
“Monsieur de St. Gré,” I replied with difficulty, “you will
confine yourself to the matter in hand. You are in no situation to
demand terms; you must take or leave what is offered you. Last
night the man called Gignoux, who was of your party, was at the
Governor’s house.”
At this he started perceptibly.
“Ha, I thought he was a traitor,” he cried. Strangely enough, he
did not doubt my word in this.
“I am surprised that your Father’s house has not been searched
this morning,” I continued, astonished at my own moderation. "The
sentiments of the Baron de Carondelet are no doubt known to you,
and you are aware that your family or your friends cannot save you
if you are arrested. You may have this money on two conditions.
The first is that you leave the province immediately. The second,
that you reveal the whereabouts of Mr. Nicholas Temple.”
“Monsieur is very kind,” he replied, and added the taunt, “and
well versed in the conduct of affairs of money.”
“Does Monsieur de St. Gré accept?” I asked.
He threw out his hands with a gesture of resignation.
“Who am I to accept?” he said, “a fugitive, an outcast. And I
should like to remind Monsieur that time passes.”
“It is a sensible observation,” said I, meaning that it was the
first. His sudden docility made me suspicious. "What preparations
have you made to go?”
“They are not elaborate, Monsieur, but they are complete. When I
leave you I step into a pirogue which is tied to the river bank.”
“Ah,” I replied. "And Mr. Temple?”
Madame la Vicomtesse smiled, for Auguste was fairly caught. He
had not the astuteness to be a rogue; oddly he had the sense to
know that he could fool us no longer.
“Temple is at Lamarque’s,” he answered sullenly.
I glanced questioningly at the Vicomtesse.
“Lamarque is an old pensioner of Monsieur de St. Gré’s,” said
she; "he has a house and an arpent of land not far below here.”
“Exactly,” said Auguste, “and if Mr. Ritchie believes that he
will save money by keeping Mr. Temple in Louisiana instead of
giving him this opportunity to escape, it is no concern of mine.”
I reflected a moment on this, for it was another sensible
remark.
“It is indeed no concern of yours,” said Madame la Vicomtesse.
He shrugged his shoulders.
“And now,” he said, “I take it that there are no further
conscientious scruples against my receiving this paltry sum.”
“I will go with you to your pirogue,” I answered, “when you
embark you shall have it.”
“I, too, will go,” said Madame la Vicomtesse.
“You overwhelm me with civility, Madame,” said the Sieur de St.
Gre, bowing low.
“Lead the way, Monsieur,” I said.
He took his bundle, and started off down the garden path with a
grand air. I looked at the Vicomtesse inquiringly, and there was
laughter in her eyes.
“I must show you the way to Lamarque’s.” And then she whispered,
"You have done well, Mr. Ritchie.”
I did not return her look, but waited until she took the path
ahead of me. In silence we followed Auguste through the depths of
the woods, turning here and there to avoid a fallen tree or a
sink-hole where the water still remained. At length we came out in
the glare of the sun and crossed the dusty road to the levee bank.
Some forty yards below us was the canoe, and we walked to it,
still in silence. Auguste flung in his bundle, and turned to us.
“Perhaps Monsieur is satisfied,” he said.
I handed him the bag, and he took it with an elaborate air of
thankfulness. Nay, the rascal opened it as if to assure himself
that he was not tricked at the last. At the sight of the gold and
silver which Antoinette had hastily collected, he turned to Madame
la Vicomtesse.
“Should I have the good fortune to meet Monsieur le Vicomte in
France, I shall assure him that Madame is in good hands" (he swept
an exultant look at me) "and enjoying herself.”
I could have flung him into the river, money-bag and all. But
Madame la Vicomtesse made him a courtesy there on the levee bank,
and said sweetly: —
“That is very good of you, Auguste.”
“As for you, Monsieur,” he said, and now his voice shook with
uncontrolled rage, “I am in no condition to repay your kindnesses.
But I have no doubt that you will not object to keeping the
miniature a while longer.”
I was speechless with anger and shame, and though I felt the
eyes of the Vicomtesse upon me, I dared not look at her. I heard
Auguste but indistinctly as he continued: —
“Should you need the frame, Monsieur, you will doubtless find it
still with Monsieur Isadore, the Jew, in the Rue Toulouse.” With
that he leaped into his boat, seized the paddle, and laughed as he
headed into the current. How long I stood watching him as he
drifted lazily in the sun I know not, but at length the voice of
Madame la Vicomtesse aroused me.
“He is a pleasant person,” she said.
UNTIL then it seemed as if the sun had gotten into my brain and
set it on fire. Her words had the strange effect of clearing my
head, though I was still in as sad a predicament as ever I found
myself. There was the thing in my pocket, still wrapped in Polly
Ann’s handkerchief. I glanced at the Vicomtesse shyly, and turned
away again. Her face was all repressed laughter, the expression I
knew so well.
“I think we should feel better in the shade, Mr. Ritchie,” she
said in English, and, leaping lightly down from the bank, crossed
the road again. I followed her, perforce.
“I will show you the way to Lamarque’s,” she said.
“Madame la Vicomtesse!” I cried.
Had she no curiosity? Was she going to let pass what Auguste had
hinted? Lifting up her skirts, she swung round and faced me. In
her eyes was a calmness more baffling than the light I had seen
there but a moment since. How to begin I knew not, and yet I was
launched.
“Madame la Vicomtesse, there was once a certain miniature
painted of you.”
“By Boze, Monsieur,” she answered, readily enough. The
embarrassment was all on my side. "We spoke of it last evening. I
remember well when it was taken. It was the costume I wore at
Chantilly, and Monsieur le Prince complimented me, and the next
day the painter himself came to our hotel in the Rue de Bretagne
and asked the honor of painting me.” She sighed. "Ah, those were
happy days! Her Majesty was very angry with me.”
“And why?” I asked, forgetful of my predicament.
“For sending it to Louisiana, to Antoinette.”
“And why did you send it?”
“A whim,” said the Vicomtesse. "I had always written twice a
year either to Monsieur de St. Gré or Antoinette, and although I
had never seen them, I loved them. Perhaps it was because they had
the patience to read my letters and the manners to say they liked
them.”
“Surely not, Madame,” I said. "Monsieur de St. Gré spoke often
to me of the wonderful pictures you drew of the personages at
court.”
Madame la Vicomtesse had an answer on the tip of her tongue. I
know now that she spared me.
“And what of this miniature, Monsieur?” she asked. "What became
of it after you restored it to its rightful owner?”
I flushed furiously and fumbled in my pocket.
“I obtained it again, Madame,” I said.
“You obtained it!” she cried, I am not sure to this day whether
in consternation or jest. In passing, it was not just what I
wanted to say.
“I meant to give it you last night,” I said.
“And why did you not?” she demanded severely.
I felt her eyes on me, and it seemed to me as if she were
looking into my very soul. Even had it been otherwise, I could not
have told her how I had lived with this picture night and day, how
I had dreamed of it, how it had been my inspiration and counsel. I
drew it from my pocket, wrapped as it was in the handkerchief, and
uncovered it with a reverence which she must have marked, for she
turned away to pick a yellow flower by the roadside. I thank
Heaven that she did not laugh. Indeed, she seemed to be far from
laughter.
“You have taken good care of it, Monsieur,” she said. "I thank
you.”
“It was not mine, Madame,” I answered.
“And if it had been?” she asked.
It was a strange prompting.
“If it had been, I could have taken no better care of it,” I
answered, and I held it towards her.
She took it simply.
“And the handkerchief?” she said.
“The handkerchief was Polly Ann’s,” I answered.
She stopped to pick a second flower that had grown by the first.
“Who is Polly Ann?” she said.
“When I was eleven years of age and ran away from Temple Bow
after my father died, Polly Ann found me in the hills. When she
married Tom McChesney they took me across the mountains into
Kentucky with them. Polly Ann has been more than a mother to me.”
“Oh!” said Madame la Vicomtesse. Then she looked at me with a
stranger expression than I had yet seen in her face. She thrust
the miniature in her gown, turned, and walked in silence awhile.
Then she said: —
“So Auguste sold it again?”
“Yes,” I said.
“He seems to have found a ready market only in you,” said the
Vicomtesse, without turning her head. "Here we are at Lamarque’s.”
What I saw was a low, weather-beaten cabin on the edge of a
clearing, and behind it stretched away in prim rows the vegetables
which the old Frenchman had planted. There was a little flower
garden, too, and an orchard. A path of beaten earth led to the
door, which was open. There we paused. Seated at a rude table was
Lamarque himself, his hoary head bent over the cards he held in
his hand. Opposite him was Mr. Nicholas Temple, in the act of
playing the ace of spades. I think that it was the laughter of
Madame la Vicomtesse that first disturbed them, and even then she
had time to turn to me.
“I like your cousin,” she whispered.
“Is that you, St. Gré?” said Nick. "I wish to the devil you
would learn not to sneak. You frighten me. Where the deuce did you
go to?”
But Lamarque had seen the lady, stared at her wildly for a
moment, and rose, dropping his cards on the floor. He bowed
humbly, not without trepidation.
“Madame la Vicomtesse!” he said.
By this time Nick had risen, and he, too, was staring at her.
How he managed to appear so well dressed was a puzzle to me.
“Madame,” he said, bowing, “I beg your pardon. I thought you
were that — I beg your pardon.”
“I understand your feelings, sir,” answered the Vicomtesse as
she courtesied.
“Egad,” said Nick, and looked at her again. "Egad, I’ll be
hanged if it’s not — "
It was the first time I had seen the Vicomtesse in confusion.
And indeed if it were confusion she recovered instantly.
“You will probably be hanged, sir, if you do not mend your
company,” she said. "Do you not think so, Mr. Ritchie?”
“Davy!” he cried. And catching sight of me in the doorway, over
her shoulder, “Has he followed me here too?” Running past the
Vicomtesse, he seized me in his impulsive way and searched my
face. "So you have followed me here, old faithful! Madame,” he
added, turning to the Vicomtesse, “there is some excuse for my
getting into trouble.”
“What excuse, Monsieur?” she asked. She was smiling, yet looking
at us with shining eyes.
“The pleasure of having Mr. Ritchie get me out,” he answered.
"He has never failed me.”
“You are far from being out of this,” I said. "If the Baron de
Carondelet does not hang you or put you in the Morro, you will not
have me to thank. It will be Madame la Vicomtesse d’Ivry-le-Tour.”
“Madame la Vicomtesse!” exclaimed Nick, puzzled.
“May I present to you, Madame, Mr. Nicholas Temple?” I asked.
Nick bowed, and she courtesied again.
“So Monsieur le Baron is really after us,” said Nick. He opened
his eyes, slapped his knee, and laughed. "That may account for the
Citizen Captain de St. Gré’s absence,” he said. "By the way, Davy,
you haven’t happened by any chance to meet him?”
The Vicomtesse and I exchanged a look of understanding. Relief
was plain on her face. It was she who answered.
“We have met him — by chance, Monsieur. He has just left for Terre
aux Bœufs.”
“Terre aux Bœufs! What the dev — I beg your pardon, Madame la
Vicomtesse, but you give me something of a surprise. Is there
another conspiracy at Terre aux Bœufs, or — does somebody live
there who has never before lent Auguste money?”
Madame la Vicomtesse laughed. Then she grew serious again.
“You did not know where he had gone?” she said.
“I did not even know he had gone,” said Nick. "Citizen Lamarque
and I were having a little game of piquet — for vegetables. Eh,
citizen?”
Madame la Vicomtesse laughed again, and once more the shade of
sadness came into her eyes.
“They are the same the world over,” she said, — not to me, nor yet
to any one there. And I knew that she was thinking of her own kind
in France, who faced the guillotine without sense of danger. She
turned to Nick. "You may be interested to know, Mr. Temple,” she
added, “that Auguste is on his way to the English Turn to take
ship for France.”
Nick regarded her for a moment, and then his face lighted up
with that smile which won every one he met, which inevitably made
them smile back at him.
“The news is certainly unexpected, Madame,” he said. "But then,
after one has travelled much with Auguste it is difficult to take
a great deal of interest in him. Am I to be sent to France, too?”
he asked.
“Not if it can be helped,” replied the Vicomtesse, seriously.
"Mr. Ritchie will tell you, however, that you are in no small
danger. Doubtless you know it. Monsieur le Baron de Carondelet
considers that the intrigues of the French Revolutionists in
Louisiana have already robbed him of several years of his life. He
is not disposed to be lenient towards persons connected with that
cause.”
“What have you been doing since you arrived here on this
ridiculous mission?” I demanded impatiently.
“My cousin is a narrow man, Madame la Vicomtesse,” said Nick.
"We enjoy ourselves in different ways. I thought there might be
some excitement in this matter, and I was sadly mistaken.”
“It is not over yet,” said the Vicomtesse.
“And Davy,” continued Nick, bowing to me, “gets his pleasures
and excitement by extracting me from my various entanglements.
Well, there is not much to tell. St. Gré and I were joined above
Natchez by that little pig, Citizen Gignoux, and we shot past De
Lemos in the night. Since then we have been permitted to sleep — no
more — at various plantations. We have been waked up at barbarous
hours in the morning and handed on, as it were. They were all fond
of us, but likewise they were all afraid of the Baron. What day is
to-day? Monday? Then it was on Saturday that we lost Gignoux.”
“I have reason to think that he has already sold out to the
Baron,” I put in.
“Eh?”
“I saw him in communication with the police at the Governor’s
hotel last night,” I answered.
Nick was silent for a moment.
“Well,” he said, “that may make some excitement.” Then he
laughed. "I wonder why Auguste didn’t think of doing that,” he
said. "And now, what?”
“How did you get to this house?” I said.
“We came down on Saturday night, after we had lost Gignoux above
the city.”
“Do you know where you are?” I asked.
“Not I,” said Nick. "I have been playing piquet with Lamarque
most of the time since I arrived. He is one of the pleasantest men
I have met in Louisiana, although a little taciturn, as you
perceive, and more than a little deaf. I think he does not like
Auguste. He seems to have known him in his youth.”
Madame la Vicomtesse looked at him with interest.
“You are at Les Iles, Nick,” I said; "you are on Monsieur de St.
Gre’s plantation, and within a quarter of a mile of his house.”
His face became grave all at once. He seized me by both
shoulders, and looked into my face.
“You say that we are at Les Iles?” he repeated slowly.
I nodded, seeing the deception which Auguste had evidently
practised in order to get him here. Then Nick dropped his arms,
went to the door, and stood for a long time with his back turned
to us, looking out over the fields. When finally he spoke it was
in the tone he used in anger.
“If I had him now, I think I would kill him,” he said.
Auguste had deluded him in other things, had run away and
deserted him in a strange land. But this matter of bringing him to
Les Iles was past pardon. It was another face he turned to the
Vicomtesse, a stronger face, a face ennobled by a just anger.
“Madame la Vicomtesse,” he said, “I have a vague notion that you
are related to Monsieur de St. Gré. I give you my word of honor as
a gentleman that I had no thought of trespassing upon him in any
way.”
“Mr. Temple, we were so sure of that — Mr. Ritchie and I — that we
should not have sought for you here otherwise,” she replied
quickly. Then she glanced at me as though seeking my approval for
her next move. It was characteristic of her that she did not now
shirk a task imposed by her sense of duty. "We have little time,
Mr. Temple, and much to say. Perhaps you will excuse us,
Lamarque,” she added graciously, in French.
“Madame la Vicomtesse!” said the old man. And, with the tact of
his race, he bowed and retired. The Vicomtesse seated herself on
one of the rude chairs, and looked at Nick curiously. There was no
such thing as embarrassment in her manner, no trace of misgiving
that she would not move properly in the affair. Knowing Nick as I
did, the difficulty of the task appalled me, for no man was
likelier than he to fly off at a misplaced word.
Her beginning was so bold that I held my breath, knowing full
well as I did that she had chosen the very note.
“Sit down, Mr. Temple,” she said. "I wish to speak to you about
your mother.”
He stopped like a man who had been struck, straightened, and
stared at her as though he had not taken her meaning. Then he
swung on me.
“Your mother is in New Orleans,” I said. "I would have told you
in Louisville had you given me the chance.”
“It is an interesting piece of news, David,” he answered, “which
you might have spared me. Mrs. Temple did not think herself
necessary to my welfare when I was young, and now I have learned
to live without her.”
“Is there no such thing as expiation, Monsieur?” said the
Vicomtesse.
“Madame,” he said, “she made me what I am, and when I might have
redeemed myself she came between me and happiness.”
“Monsieur,” said the Vicomtesse, “have you ever considered her
sufferings?”
He looked at the Vicomtesse with a new interest. She was not so
far beyond his experience as mine.
“Her sufferings?” he repeated, and smiled.
“Madame la Vicomtesse should know them,” I interrupted; and
without heeding her glance of protest I continued, “It is she who
has cared for Mrs. Temple.”
“You, Madame!” he exclaimed.
“Do not deny your own share in it, Mr. Ritchie,” she answered.
"As for me, Monsieur,” she went on, turning to Nick, “I have done
nothing that was not selfish. I have been in the world, I have
lived my life, misfortunes have come upon me too. My visits to
your mother have been to me a comfort, a pleasure, — for she is a
rare person.”
“I have never found her so, Madame,” he said briefly.
“I am sure it is your misfortune rather than your fault, Mr.
Temple. It is because you do not know her now.”
Again he looked at me, puzzled, uneasy, like a man who would run
if he could. But by a kind of fascination his eyes went back to
this woman who dared a subject sore to the touch — who pressed it
gently, but with determination, never doubting her powers, yet
with a kindness and sympathy of tone which few women of the world
possess. The Vicomtesse began to speak again, evenly, gently.
“Mr. Temple,” said she, “I am merely going to tell you some
things which I am sure you do not know, and when I have finished I
shall not appeal to you. It would be useless for me to try to
influence you, and from what Mr. Ritchie and others have told me
of your character I am sure that no influence will be necessary.
And,” she added, with a smile, “it would be much more comfortable
for us both if you sat down.”
He obeyed her without a word. No wonder Madame la Vicomtesse had
had an influence at court.
“There!” she said. "If any reference I am about to make gives
you pain, I am sorry.” She paused briefly. "After Mr. Ritchie took
your mother from here to New Orleans, some five years ago, she
rented a little house in the Rue Bourbon with a screen of yellow
and red tiles at the edge of the roof. It is on the south side,
next to the corner of the Rue St. Philippe. There she lives
absolutely alone, except for a servant. Mr. Clark, who has charge
of her affairs, was the only person she allowed to visit her. For
her pride, however misplaced, and for her spirit we must all
admire her. The friend who discovered where she was, who went to
her and implored Mrs. Temple to let her stay, she refused.”
“The friend?” he repeated in a low tone. I scarcely dared to
glance at the Vicomtesse.
“Yes, it was Antoinette,” she answered. He did not reply, but
his eyes fell. "Antoinette went to her, would have comforted her,
would have cared for her, but your mother sent her away. For five
years she has lived there, Mr. Temple, alone with her past, alone
with her sorrow and remorse. You must draw the picture for
yourself. If the world has a more terrible punishment, I have not
heard of it. And when, some months ago, I came, and Antoinette
sent me to her — "
“Sent you to her!” he said, raising his head quickly.
“Under another name than my own,” Hélène continued, apparently
taking no notice of his interruption. She leaned toward him and
her voice faltered. "I found your mother dying.”
He said nothing, but got to his feet and walked slowly to the
door, where he stood looking out again. I felt for him, I would
have gone to him then had it not been for the sense in me that
Hélène did not wish it. As for Hélène, she sat waiting for him to
turn back to her, and at length he did.
“Yes?” he said.
“It is her heart, Mr. Temple, that we fear the most. Last night
I thought the end had come. It cannot be very far away now. Sorrow
and remorse have killed her, Monsieur. The one thing that she has
prayed for through the long nights is that she might see you once
again and obtain your forgiveness. God Himself does not withhold
forgiveness, Mr. Temple,” said the Vicomtesse, gently. "Shall any
of us presume to?”
A spasm of pain crossed his face, and then his expression
hardened.
“I might have been a useful man,” he said; "she ruined my life — "
“And you will allow her to ruin the rest of it?” asked the
Vicomtesse.
He stared at her.
“If you do not go to her and forgive her, you will remember it
until you die,” she said.
He sank down on the chair opposite to her, his head bowed into
his hands, his elbows on the table among the cards. At length I
went and laid my hands upon his shoulder, and at my touch he
started. Then he did a singular thing, an impulsive thing,
characteristic of the old Nick I had known. He reached across the
table and seized the hand of Madame la Vicomtesse. She did not
resist, and her smile I shall always remember. It was the smile of
a woman who has suffered, and understands.
“I will go to her, Madame!” he said, springing to his feet. "I
will go to her. I — I was wrong.”
She rose, too, he still clinging to her hand, she still
unresisting. His eye fell upon me.
“Where is my hat, Davy?” he asked.
The Vicomtesse withdrew her hand and looked at me.
“Alas, it is not quite so simple as that, Mr. Temple,” she said;
"Monsieur de Carondelet has first to be reckoned with.”
“She is dying, you say? then I will go to her. After that
Monsieur de Carondelet may throw me into prison, may hang me, may
do anything he chooses. But I will go to her.”
I glanced anxiously at the Vicomtesse, well knowing how wilful
he was when aroused. Admiration was in her eyes, seeing that he
was heedless of his own danger.
“You would not get through the gates of the city. Monsieur le
Baron requires passports now,” she said.
At that he began to pace the little room, his hands clenched.
“I could use your passport, Davy,” he cried. "Let me have it.”
“Pardon me, Mr. Temple, I do not think you could,” said the
Vicomtesse. I flushed. I suppose the remark was not to be
resisted.
“Then I will go to-night,” he said, with determination. "It will
be no trouble to steal into the city. You say the house has yellow
and red tiles, and is near the Rue St. Philippe?”
Hélène laid her fingers on his arm.
“Listen, Monsieur, there is a better way,” she said. "Monsieur
le Baron is doubtless very angry with you, and I am sure that this
is chiefly because he does not know you. For instance, if some one
were to tell him that you are a straightforward, courageous young
man, a gentleman with an unquenchable taste for danger, that you
are not a low-born adventurer and intriguer, that you have nothing
in particular against his government, he might not be quite so
angry. Pardon me if I say that he is not disposed to take your
expedition any more seriously than is your own Federal government.
The little Baron is irascible, choleric, stern, or else
good-natured, good-hearted, and charitable, just as one happens to
take him. As we say in France, it is not well to strike flint and
steel in his presence. He might blow up and destroy one. Suppose
some one were to go to Monsieur de Carondelet and tell him what a
really estimable person you are, and assure him that you will go
quietly out of his province at the first opportunity, and be good,
so far as he is concerned, forever after? Mark me, I merely say
SUPPOSE. I do not know how far things have gone, or what he may
have heard. But suppose a person whom I have reason to believe he
likes and trusts and respects, a person who understands his
vagaries, should go to him on such an errand.”
“And where is such a person to be found,” said Nick, amused in
spite of himself.
Madame la Vicomtesse courtesied.
“Monsieur, she is before you,” she said.
“Egad,” he cried, “do you mean to say, Madame, that you will go
to the Baron on my behalf?”
“As soon as I ever get to town,” she said. "He will have to be
waked from his siesta, and he does not like that.”
“But he will forgive you,” said Nick, quick as a flash.
“I have reason to believe he will,” said Madame la Vicomtesse.
“Faith,” cried Nick, “he would not be flesh and blood if he
didn’t.”
At that the Vicomtesse laughed, and her eye rested judicially on
me. I was standing rather glumly, I fear, in the corner.
“Are you going to take him with you?” said Nick.
“I was thinking of it,” said the Vicomtesse. "Mr. Ritchie knows
you, and he is such a reliable and reputable person.”
Nick bowed.
“You should have seen him marching in a Jacobin procession,
Madame,” he said.
“He follows his friends into strange places,” she retorted.
“And now, Mr. Temple,” she added, “may we trust you to stay here
with Lamarque until you have word from us?”
“You know I cannot stay here,” he cried.
“And why not, Monsieur?”
“If I were captured here, I should get Monsieur de St. Gré into
trouble; and besides,” he said, with a touch of coldness, “I
cannot be beholden to Monsieur de St. Gré. I cannot remain on his
land.”
“As for getting Monsieur de St. Gré into trouble, his own son
could not involve him with the Baron,” answered Madame la
Vicomtesse. "And it seems to me, Monsieur, that you are already so
far beholden to Monsieur de St. Gré that you cannot quibble about
going a little more into his debt. Come, Mr. Temple, how has
Monsieur de St. Gré ever offended you?”
“Madame — " he began.
“Monsieur,” she said, with an air not to be denied, “I believe I
can discern a point of honor as well as you. I fail to see that
you have a case.”
He was indeed no match for her. He turned to me appealingly, his
brows bent, but I had no mind to meddle. He swung back to her.
“But Madame — !” he cried.
She was arranging the cards neatly on the table.
“Monsieur, you are tiresome,” she said. "What is it now?”
He took a step toward her, speaking in a low tone, his voice
shaking. But, true to himself, he spoke plainly. As for me, I
looked on frightened, — as though watching a contest, — almost agape
to see what a clever woman could do.
“There is — Mademoiselle de St. Gré — "
“Yes, there is Mademoiselle de St. Gré,” repeated the
Vicomtesse, toying with the cards.
His face lighted, though his lips twitched with pain.
“She is still — "
“She is still Mademoiselle de St. Gré, Monsieur, if that is what
you mean.”
“And what will she think if I stay here?”
“Ah, do you care what she thinks, Mr. Temple?” said the
Vicomtesse, raising her head quickly. "From what I have heard, I
should not have thought you could.”
“God help me,” he answered simply, “I do care.”
Hélène’s eyes softened as she looked at him, and my pride in him
was never greater than at that moment.
“Mr. Temple,” she said gently, “remain where you are and have
faith in us. I begin to see now why you are so fortunate in your
friends.” Her glance rested for a brief instant on me. "Mr.
Ritchie and I will go to New Orleans, talk to the Baron, and send
Andreacute; at once with a message. If it is in our power, you shall see
your mother very soon.”
She held out her hand to him, and he bent and kissed it
reverently, with an ease I envied. He followed us to the door. And
when the Vicomtesse had gone a little way down the path she looked
at him over her shoulder.
“Do not despair, Mr. Temple,” she said.
It was an answer to a yearning in his face. He gripped me by the
shoulders.
“God bless you, Davy,” he whispered, and added, “God bless you
both.”
I overtook her where the path ran into the forest’s shade, and
for a long while I walked after her, not breaking her silence, my
eyes upon her, a strange throbbing in my forehead which I did not
heed. At last, when the perfumes of the flowers told us we were
nearing the garden, she turned to me.
“I like Mr. Temple,” she said, again.
“He is an honest gentleman,” I answered.
“One meets very few of them,” she said, speaking in a low voice.
"You and I will go to the Governor. And after that, have you any
idea where you will go?”
“No,” I replied, troubled by her regard.
“Then I will tell you. I intend to send you to Madame Gravois’s,
and she will compel you to go to bed and rest. I do not mean to
allow you to kill yourself.”
THE SUN beat down mercilessly on thatch and terrace, the yellow
walls flung back the quivering heat, as Madame la Vicomtesse and I
walked through the empty streets towards the Governor’s house. We
were followed by Andreacute; and Madame’s maid. The sleepy orderly
started up from under the archway at our approach, bowed
profoundly to Madame, looked askance at me, and declared, with a
thousand regrets, that Monsieur le Baron was having his siesta.
“Then you will wake him,” said Madame la Vicomtesse.
Wake Monsieur le Baron! Bueno Dios, did Madame understand what
it meant to wake his Excellency? His Excellency would at first be
angry, no doubt. Angry? As an Andalusian bull, Madame. Once, when
his Excellency had first come to the province, he, the orderly,
had presumed to awake him.
“Assez!” said Madame, so suddenly that the man straightened and
looked at her again. "You will wake Monsieur le Baron, and tell
him that Madame la Vicomtesse d’Ivry-le-Tour has something of
importance to say to him.”
Madame had the air, and a title carried with a Spanish soldier
in New Orleans in those days. The orderly fairly swept the ground
and led us through a court where the sun drew bewildering hot
odors from the fruits and flowers, into a darkened room which was
the Baron’s cabinet. I remember it vaguely, for my head was hot
and throbbing from my exertions in such a climate. It was a new
room, — the hotel being newly built, — with white walls, a picture of
his Catholic Majesty and the royal arms of Spain, a map of
Louisiana, another of New Orleans fortified, some walnut chairs, a
desk with ink and sand and a seal, and a window, the closed
lattice shutters of which showed streaks of light green light.
These doubtless opened on the Royal Road and looked across the
levee esplanade on the waters of the Mississippi. Madame la
Vicomtesse seated herself, and with a gesture which was an order
bade me do likewise.
“He will be angry, the dear Baron,” she said. "He is harassed to
death with republics. No offence, Mr. Ritchie. He is up at dawn
looking to the forts and palisades to guard against such foolish
enterprises as this of Mr. Temple’s. And to be waked out of a
well-earned siesta — to save a gentleman who has come here to make
things unpleasant for him — is carrying a joke a little far.
Mais — que voulez-vous?”
She gave a little shrug to her slim shoulders as she smiled at
me, and she seemed not a whit disturbed concerning the
conversation with his Excellency. I wondered whether this were
birth, or training, or both, or a natural ability to cope with
affairs. The women of her order had long been used to intercede
with sovereigns, to play a part in matters of state. Suddenly I
became aware that she was looking at me.
“What are you thinking of?” she demanded, and continued without
waiting for a reply, “you strange man.”
“I was thinking how odd it was,” I replied, “that I should have
known you all these years by a portrait, that we should finally be
thrown together, and that you should be so exactly like the person
I had supposed you to be.”
She lowered her eyes, but she did not seem to take offence. I
meant none.
“And you,” she answered, “are continually reminding me of an
Englishman I knew when I was a girl. He was a very queer person to
be attached to the Embassy, — not a courtier, but a serious, literal
person like you, Mr. Ritchie, and he resembled you very much. I
was very fond of him.”
“And — what became of him?” I asked. Other questions rose to my
lips, but I put them down.
“I will tell you,” she answered, bending forward a little. "He
did something which I believe you might have done. A certain
Marquis spoke lightly of a lady, an Englishwoman at our court, and
my Englishman ran him through one morning at Versailles.”
She paused, and I saw that her breath was coming more quickly at
the remembrance.
“And then?”
“He fled to England. He was a younger son, and poor. But his
King heard of the affair, had it investigated, and restored him to
the service. I have never seen him since,” she said, “but I have
often thought of him. There,” she added, after a silence, with a
lightness which seemed assumed, “I have given you a romance. How
long the Baron takes to dress!”
At that moment there were footsteps in the court-yard, and the
orderly appeared at the door, saluting, and speaking in Spanish.
“His Excellency the Governor!”
We rose, and Madame was courtesying and I was bowing to the
little man. He was in uniform, his face perspiring in the creases,
his plump calves stretching his white stockings to the full.
Madame extended her hand and he kissed it, albeit he did not bend
easily. He spoke in French, and his voice betrayed the fact that
his temper was near slipping its leash. The Baron was a native of
Flanders.
“To what happy circumstance do I owe the honor of this visit,
Madame la Vicomtesse?” he asked.
“To a woman’s whim, Monsieur le Baron,” she answered, “for a man
would not have dared to disturb you. May I present to your
Excellency, Mr. David Ritchie of Kentucky?”
His Excellency bowed stiffly, looked at me with no pretence of
pleasure, and I had had sufficient dealings with men to divine
that, in the coming conversation, the overflow of his temper would
be poured upon me. His first sensation was surprise.
“An American!” he said, in a tone that implied reproach to
Madame la Vicomtesse for having fallen into such company. "Ah,” he
cried, breathing hard in the manner of stout people, “I remember
you came down with Monsieur Vigo, Monsieur, did you not?”
It was my turn to be surprised. If the Baron took a like
cognizance of all my countrymen who came to New Orleans, he was a
busy man indeed.
“Yes, your Excellency,” I answered.
“And you are a Federalist?” he said, though petulantly.
“I am, your Excellency.”
“Is your nation to overrun the earth?” said the Baron. "Every
morning when I ride through the streets it seems to me that more
Americans have come. Pardieu, I declare every day that, if it were
not for the Americans, I should have ten years more of life ahead
of me.” I could not resist the temptation to glance at Madame la
Vicomtesse. Her eyes, half closed, betrayed an amusement that was
scarce repressed.
“Come, Monsieur le Baron,” she said, “you and I have like
beliefs upon most matters. We have both suffered at the hands of
people who have mistaken a fiend for a Lady.”
“You would have me believe, Madame,” the Baron put in, with a
wit I had not thought in him, “that Mr. Ritchie knows a lady when
he sees one. I can readily believe it.”
Madame laughed.
“He at least has a negative knowledge,” she replied. "And he has
brought into New Orleans no coins, boxes, or clocks against your
Excellency’s orders with the image and superscription of the
Goddess in whose name all things are done. He has not sung ’Ca
Ira’ at the theatres, and he detests the tricolored cockades as
much as you do.”
The Baron laughed in spite of himself, and began to thaw. There
was a little more friendliness in his next glance at me.
“What images have you brought in, Mr. Ritchie?” he asked. "We
all worship the sex in some form, however misplaced our notions of
it.”
There is not the least doubt that, for the sake of the
Vicomtesse, he was trying to be genial, and that his remark was a
purely random one. But the roots of my hair seemed to have taken
fire. I saw the Baron as in a glass, darkly. But I kept my head,
principally because the situation had elements of danger.
“The image of Madame la Vicomtesse, Monsieur,” I said.
“Dame!” exclaimed his Excellency, eying me with a new interest,
"I did not suspect you of being a courtier.”
“No more he is, Monsieur le Baron,” said the Vicomtesse, “for he
speaks the truth.”
His Excellency looked blank. As for me, I held my breath,
wondering what coup Madame was meditating.
“Mr. Ritchie brought down from Kentucky a miniature of me by
Boze, that was painted in a costume I once wore at Chantilly.”
“Comment! diable,” exclaimed the Baron. "And how did such a
thing get into Kentucky, Madame?”
“You have brought me to the point,” she replied, “which is no
small triumph for your Excellency. Mr. Ritchie bought the
miniature from that most estimable of my relations, Monsieur
Auguste de St. Gré.”
The Baron sat down and began to fan himself. He even grew a
little purple. He looked at Madame, sputtered, and I began to
think that, if he didn’t relieve himself, his head might blow off.
As for the Vicomtesse, she wore an ingenuous air of detachment,
and seemed supremely unconscious of the volcano by her side.
“So, Madame,” cried the Governor at length, after I know not
what repressions, “you have come here in behalf of that — of Auguste
de St. Gré!”
“So far as I am concerned, Monsieur,” answered the Vicomtesse,
calmly, “you may hang Auguste, put him in prison, drown him, or do
anything you like with him.”
“God help me,” said the poor man, searching for his
handkerchief, and utterly confounded, “why is it you have come to
me, then? Why did you wake me up?” he added, so far forgetting
himself.
“I came in behalf of the gentleman who had the indiscretion to
accompany Auguste to Louisiana,” she continued, “in behalf of Mr.
Nicholas Temple, who is a cousin of Mr. Ritchie.”
The Baron started abruptly from his chair.
“I have heard of him,” he cried; "Madame knows where he is?”
“I know where he is. It is that which I came to tell your
Excellency.”
“Hein!” said his Excellency, again nonplussed. "You came to tell
me where he is? And where the — the other one is?”
“Parfaitement,” said Madame. "But before I tell you where they
are, I wish to tell you something about Mr. Temple.”
“Madame, I know something of him already,” said the Baron,
impatiently.
“Ah,” said she, “from Gignoux. And what do you hear from
Gignoux?”
This was another shock, under which the Baron fairly staggered.
“Diable! is Madame la Vicomtesse in the plot?” he cried. "What
does Madame know of Gignoux?”
Madame’s manner suddenly froze.
“I am likely to be in the plot, Monsieur,” she said. "I am
likely to be in a plot which has for its furtherance that
abominable anarchy which deprived me of my home and estates, of my
relatives and friends and my sovereign.”
“A thousand pardons, Madame la Vicomtesse,” said the Baron, more
at sea than ever. "I have had much to do these last years, and the
heat and the Republicans have got on my temper. Will Madame la
Vicomtesse pray explain?”
“I was about to do so when your Excellency interrupted,” said
Madame. "You see before you Mr. Ritchie, barrister, of Louisville,
Kentucky, whose character of sobriety, dependence, and ability"
(there was a little gleam in her eye as she gave me this array of
virtues) "can be perfectly established. When he came to New
Orleans some years ago he brought letters to Monsieur de St. Gré
from Monsieur Gratiot and Colonel Chouteau of St. Louis, and he is
known to Mr. Clark and to Monsieur Vigo. He is a Federalist, as
you know, and has no sympathy with the Jacobins.”
“Eh bien, Mr. Ritchie,” said the Baron, getting his breath, “you
are fortunate in your advocate. Madame la Vicomtesse neglected to
say that she was your friend, the greatest of all recommendations
in my eyes.”
“You are delightful, Monsieur le Baron,” said the Vicomtesse.
“Perhaps Mr. Ritchie can tell me something of this expedition,”
said the Baron, his eyes growing smaller as he looked at me.
“Willingly,” I answered. "Although I know that your Excellency
is well informed, and that Monsieur Vigo has doubtless given you
many of the details that I know.”
He interrupted me with a grunt.
“You Americans are clever people, Monsieur,” he said; "you
contrive to combine shrewdness with frankness.”
“If I had anything to hide from your Excellency, I should not be
here,” I answered. "The expedition, as you know, has been as much
of a farce as Citizen Genet’s commissions. But it has been a sad
farce to me, inasmuch as it involves the honor of my old friend
and Colonel, General Clark, and the safety of my cousin, Mr.
Temple.”
“So you were with Clark in Illinois?” said the Baron, craftily.
"Pardon me, Mr. Ritchie, but I should have said that you are too
young.”
“Monsieur Vigo will tell you that I was the drummer boy of the
regiment, and a sort of ward of the Colonel’s. I used to clean his
guns and cook his food.”
“And you did not see fit to follow your Colonel to Louisiana?”
said his Excellency, for he had been trained in a service of
suspicion.
“General Clark is not what he was,” I replied, chafing a little
at his manner; "your Excellency knows that, and I put loyalty to
my government before friendship. And I might remind your
Excellency that I am neither an adventurer nor a fool.”
The little Baron surprised me by laughing. His irritability and
his good nature ran in streaks.
“There is no occasion to, Mr. Ritchie,” he answered. "I have
seen something of men in my time. In which category do you place
your cousin, Mr. Temple?”
“If a love of travel and excitement and danger constitutes an
adventurer, Mr. Temple is such,” I said. "Fortunately the main
spur of the adventurer’s character is lacking in his case. I refer
to the desire for money. Mr. Temple has an annuity from his
father’s estate in Charleston which puts him beyond the pale of
the fortune-seeker, and I firmly believe that if your Excellency
sees fit to allow him to leave the province, and if certain
disquieting elements can be removed from his life" (I glanced at
the Vicomtesse), “he will settle down and become a useful citizen
of the United States. As much as I dislike to submit to a stranger
private details in the life of a member of my family, I feel that
I must tell your Excellency something of Mr. Temple’s career, in
order that you may know that restlessness and the thirst for
adventure were the only motives that led him into this foolish
undertaking.”
“Pray proceed, Mr. Ritchie,” said the Baron.
I was surprised not to find him more restless, and in addition
the glance of approbation which the Vicomtesse gave me spurred me
on. However distasteful, I had the sense to see that I must hold
nothing back of which his Excellency might at any time become
cognizant, and therefore I told him as briefly as possible Nick’s
story, leaving out only the episode with Antoinette. When I came
to the relation of the affairs which occurred at Les Iles five
years before and told his Excellency that Mrs. Temple had since
been living in the Rue Bourbon as Mrs. Clive, unknown to her son,
the Baron broke in upon me.
“So the mystery of that woman is cleared at last,” he said, and
turned to the Vicomtesse. "I have learned that you have been a
frequent visitor, Madame.”
“Not a sparrow falls to the ground in Louisiana that your
Excellency does not hear of it,” she answered.
“And Gignoux?” he said, speaking to me again.
“As I told you, Monsieur le Baron,” I answered, “I have come to
New Orleans at a personal sacrifice to induce my cousin to abandon
this matter, and I went out last evening to try to get word of
him.” This was not strictly true. "I saw Monsieur Gignoux in
conference with some of your officers who came out of this hotel.”
“You have sharp eyes, Monsieur,” he remarked.
“I suspected the man when I met him in Kentucky,” I continued,
not heeding this. "Monsieur Vigo himself distrusted him. To say
that Gignoux were deep in the councils of the expedition, that he
held a commission from Citizen Genet, I realize will have no
weight with your Excellency, — provided the man is in the secret
service of his Majesty the King of Spain.”
“Mr. Ritchie,” said the Baron, “you are a young man and I an old
one. If I tell you that I have a great respect for your astuteness
and ability, do not put it down to flattery. I wish that your
countrymen, who are coming down the river like driftwood, more
resembled you. As for Citizen Gignoux,” he went on, smiling, and
wiping his face, “let not your heart be troubled. His Majesty’s
minister at Philadelphia has written me letters on the subject. I
am contemplating for Monsieur Gignoux a sea voyage to Havana, and
he is at present partaking of my hospitality in the calabozo.”
“In the calabozo!” I cried, overwhelmed at this example of
Spanish justice and omniscience.
“Precisely,” said the Baron, drumming with his fingers on his
fat knee. "And now,” he added, “perhaps Madame la Vicomtesse is
ready to tell me of the whereabouts of Mr. Temple and her
estimable cousin, Auguste. It may interest her to know why I have
allowed them their liberty so long.”
“A point on which I have been consumed with curiosity — since I
have begun to tremble at the amazing thoroughness of your
Excellency’s system,” said the Vicomtesse.
His Excellency scarcely looked the tyrant as he sat before us,
with his calves crossed and his hands folded on his waistcoat and
his little black eyes twinkling.
“It is because,” he said, “there are many French planters in the
province bitten with the three horrors" (he meant Liberty,
Equality, and Fraternity), “I sent six to Havana; and if Monsieur
Etienne de Bore had not, in the nick of time for him, discovered
how to make sugar he would have gone, too. I had an idea that the
Sieur de St. Gré and Mr. Temple might act as a bait to reveal the
disease in some others. Ha, I am cleverer than you thought, Mr.
Ritchie. You are surprised?”
I was surprised, and showed it.
“Come,” he said, “you are astute. Why did you think I left them
at liberty?”
“I thought your Excellency believed them to be harmless, as they
are,” I replied.
He turned again to the Vicomtesse. "You have picked up a
diplomat, Madame. I must confess that I misjudged him when you
introduced him to me. And again, where are Mr. Temple and your
estimable cousin? Shall I tell you? They are at old Lamarque’s, on
the plantation of Philippe de St. Gré.”
“They were, your Excellency,” said the Vicomtesse.
“Eh?” exclaimed the Baron, jumping.
“Mademoiselle de St. Gré has given her brother eight hundred
livres, and he is probably by this time on board a French ship at
the English Turn. He is very badly frightened. I will give your
Excellency one more surprise.”
“Madame la Vicomtesse,” said the Baron, “I have heard that, but
for your coolness and adroitness, Monsieur le Vicomte, your
husband, and several other noblemen and their ladies and some of
her Majesty’s letters and jewels would never have gotten out of
France. I take this opportunity of saying that I have the greatest
respect for your intelligence. Now what is the surprise?”
“That your Excellency intended that both Mr. Temple and Auguste
de St. Gré were to escape on that ship.”
“Mille tonneres,” exclaimed the Baron, staring at her, and
straightway he fell into a fit of laughter that left him coughing
and choking and perspiring as only a man in his condition of flesh
can perspire. To say that I was bewildered by this last evidence
of the insight of the woman beside me would be to put it mildly.
The Vicomtesse sat quietly watching him, the wonted look of
repressed laughter on her face, and by degrees his Excellency grew
calm again.
“Mon dieu,” said he, “I always like to cross swords with you,
Madame la Vicomtesse, yet this encounter has been more pleasurable
than any I have had since I came to Louisiana. But, diable,” he
cried, “just as I was congratulating myself that I was to have one
American the less, you come and tell me that he has refused to
flee. Out of consideration for the character and services of
Monsieur Philippe de St. Gré I was willing to let them both
escape. But now?”
“Mr. Temple is not known in New Orleans except to the St. Gré
family,” said the Vicomtesse. "He is a man of honor. Suppose Mr.
Ritchie were to bring him to your Excellency, and he were to give
you his word that he would leave the province at the first
opportunity? He now wishes to see his mother before she dies, and
it was as much as we could do this morning to persuade him from
going to her openly in the face of arrest.”
But the Baron was old in a service which did not do things
hastily.
“He is well enough where he is for to-day,” said his Excellency,
resuming his official manner. "To-night after dark I will send
down an officer and have him brought before me. He will not then
be seen in custody by any one, and provided I am satisfied with
him he may go to the Rue Bourbon.”
The little Baron rose and bowed to the Vicomtesse to signify
that the audience was ended, and he added, as he kissed her hand,
"Madame la Vicomtesse, it is a pleasure to be able to serve such a
woman as you.”
AS WE went through the court I felt as though I had been tied to
a string, suspended in the air, and spun. This was undoubtedly due
to the heat. And after the astonishing conversation from which we
had come, my admiration for the lady beside me was magnified to a
veritable awe. We reached the archway. Madame la Vicomtesse held
me lightly by the edge of my coat, and I stood looking down at
her.
“Wait a minute, Mr. Ritchie,” she said, glancing at the few
figures hurrying across the Place d’Armes; "those are only
Americans, and they are too busy to see us standing here. What do
you propose to do now?”
“We must get word to Nick as we promised, that he may know what
to expect,” I replied. "Suppose we go to Monsieur de St. Gré’s
house and write him a letter?”
“No,” said the Vicomtesse, with decision, “I am going to Mrs.
Temple’s. I shall write the letter from there and send it by
Andreacute;, and you will go direct to Madame Gravois’s.”
Her glance rested anxiously upon my face, and there came an
expression in her eyes which disturbed me strangely. I had not
known it since the days when Polly Ann used to mother me. But I
did not mean to give up.
“I am not tired, Madame la Vicomtesse,” I answered, “and I will
go with you to Mrs. Temple’s.”
“Give me your hand,” she said, and smiled. “Andreacute; and my maid
are used to my vagaries, and your own countrymen will not mind.
Give me your hand, Mr. Ritchie.”
I gave it willingly enough, with a thrill as she took it between
her own. The same anxious look was in her eyes, and not the least
embarrassment.
“There, it is hot and dry, as I feared,” she said, “and you seem
flushed.” She dropped my hand, and there was a touch of irritation
in her voice as she continued: "You seemed fairly sensible when I
first met you last night, Mr. Ritchie. Are you losing your sanity?
Do you not realize that you cannot take liberties with this
climate? Do as I say, and go to Madame Gravois’s at once.”
“It is my pleasure to obey you, Madame la Vicomtesse,” I
answered, “but I mean to go with you as far as Mrs. Temple’s, to
see how she fares. She may be — worse.”
“That is no reason why you should kill yourself,” said Madame,
coldly. "Will you not do as I say?”
“I think that I should go to Mrs. Temple’s,” I answered.
She did not reply to that, letting down her veil impatiently,
with a deftness that characterized all her movements. Without so
much as asking me to come after her, she reached the banquette,
and I walked by her side through the streets, silent and troubled
by her displeasure. My pride forbade me to do as she wished. It
was the hottest part of a burning day, and the dome of the sky was
like a brazen bell above us. We passed the calabozo with its iron
gates and tiny grilled windows pierced in the massive walls,
behind which Gignoux languished, and I could not repress a smile
as I thought of him. Even the Spaniards sometimes happened upon
justice. In the Rue Bourbon the little shops were empty, the
doorstep where my merry fiddler had played vacant, and the very
air seemed to simmer above the honeycombed tiles. I knocked at the
door, once, twice. There was no answer. I looked at Madame la
Vicomtesse, and knocked again so loudly that the little tailor
across the street, his shirt opened at the neck, flung out his
shutter. Suddenly there was a noise within, the door was opened,
and Lindy stood before us, in the darkened room, with terror in
her eyes.
“Oh, Marse Dave,” she cried, as we entered, “oh, Madame, I’se so
glad you’se come, I’se so glad you’se come.”
She burst into a flood of tears. And Madame la Vicomtesse,
raising her veil, seized the girl by the arm.
“What is it?” she said. "What is the matter, Lindy?”
Madame’s touch seemed to steady her.
“Miss Sally,” she moaned, “Miss Sally done got de yaller fever.”
There was a moment’s silence, for we were both too appalled by
the news to speak.
“Lindy, are you sure?” said the Vicomtesse.
“Yass’m, yass’m,” Lindy sobbed, “I reckon I’se done seed ’nuf of
it, Mistis.” And she went into a hysterical fit of weeping.
The Vicomtesse turned to her own frightened servants in the
doorway, bade Andreacute; in French to run for Dr. Perrin, and herself
closed the battened doors. There was a moment when her face as I
saw it was graven on my memory, reflecting a knowledge of the
evils of this world, a spirit above and untouched by them, a power
to accept what life may bring with no outward sign of pleasure or
dismay. Doubtless thus she had made King and Cardinal laugh,
doubtless thus, ministering to those who crossed her path, she had
met her own calamities. Strangest of all was the effect she had
upon Lindy, for the girl ceased crying as she watched her.
Madame la Vicomtesse turned to me.
“You must go at once,” she said. "When you get to Madame
Gravois’s, write to Mr. Temple. I will send Andreacute; to you there.”
She started for the bedroom door, Lindy making way for her. I
scarcely knew what I did as I sprang forward and took the
Vicomtesse by the arm.
“Where are you going?” I cried. "You cannot go in there! You
cannot go in there!”
It did not seem strange that she turned to me without anger,
that she did not seek to release her arm. It did not seem strange
that her look had in it a gentleness as she spoke.
“I must,” she said.
“I cannot let you risk your life,” I cried, wholly forgetting
myself; "there are others who will do this.”
“Others?” she said.
“I will go. I — I have nursed people before this. And there is
Lindy.”
A smile quivered on her lips, — or was it a smile?
“You will do as I say and go to Madame Gravois’s — at once,” she
murmured, striving for the first time to free herself.
“If you stay, I stay,” I answered; "and if you die, I die.”
She looked up into my eyes for a fleeting instant.
“Write to Mr. Temple,” she said.
Dazed, I watched her open the bedroom doors, motion to Lindy to
pass through, and then she had closed them again and I was alone
in the darkened parlor.
The throbbing in my head was gone, and a great clearness had
come with a great fear. I stood, I know not how long, listening to
the groans that came through the wall, for Mrs. Temple was in
agony. At intervals I heard Hélène’s voice, and then the groans
seemed to stop. Ten times I went to the bedroom door, and as many
times drew away again, my heart leaping within me at the peril
which she faced. If I had had the right, I believe I would have
carried her away by force.
But I had not the right. I sat down heavily, by the table, to
think and it might have been a cry of agony sharper than the rest
that reminded me once more of the tragedy of the poor lady in
torture. My eye fell upon the table, and there, as though prepared
for what I was to do, lay pen and paper, ink and sand. My hand
shook as I took the quill and tried to compose a letter to my
cousin. I scarcely saw the words which I put on the sheet, and I
may be forgiven for the unwisdom of that which I wrote.
“The Baron de Carondelet will send an officer for you to-night
so that you may escape observation in custody. His Excellency knew
of your hiding-place, but is inclined to be lenient, will allow
you to-morrow to go to the Rue Bourbon, and will without doubt
permit you to leave the province. Your mother is ill, and Madame
la Vicomtesse and myself are with her.
“David.”
In the state I was it took me a long time to compose this much,
and I had barely finished it when there was a knock at the outer
door. There was Andreacute;. He had the immobility of face which
sometimes goes with the mulatto, and always with the trained
servant, as he informed me that Monsieur le Medecin was not at
home, but that he had left word. There was an epidemic, Monsieur,
so Andreacute; feared. I gave him the note and his directions, and ten
minutes after he had gone I would have given much to have called
him back. How about Antoinette, alone at Les Iles? Why had I not
thought of her? We had told her nothing that morning, Madame la
Vicomtesse and I, after our conference with Nick. For the girl had
shut herself in her room, and Madame had thought it best not to
disturb her at such a stage. But would she not be alarmed when
Hélène failed to return that night? Had circumstances been
different, I myself would have ridden to Les Iles, but no
inducement now could make me desert the post I had chosen. After
many years I dislike to recall to memory that long afternoon which
I spent, helpless, in the Rue Bourbon. Now I was on my feet,
pacing restlessly the short breadth of the room, trying to shut
out from my mind the horrors of which my ears gave testimony.
Again, in the intervals of quiet, I sat with my elbows on the
table and my head in my hands, striving to allay the throbbing in
my temples. Pains came and went, and at times I felt like a fagot
flung into the fire, — I, who had never known a sick day. At times
my throat pained me, an odd symptom in a warm climate. Troubled as
I was in mind and body, the thought of Hélène’s quiet heroism
upheld me through it all. More than once I had my hand raised to
knock at the bedroom door and ask if I could help, but I dared
not; at length, the sun having done its worst and spent its fury,
I began to hear steps along the banquette and voices almost at my
elbow beyond the little window. At every noise I peered out,
hoping for the doctor. But he did not come. And then, as I fell
back into the fauteuil, there was borne on my consciousness a
sound I had heard before. It was the music of the fiddler, it was
a tune I knew, and the voices of the children were singing the
refrain: —
“Ne sait quand reviendra,
Ne sait quand reviendra.”
I rose, opened the door, and slipped out of it, and I must have
made a strange, hatless figure as I came upon the fiddler and his
children from across the street.
“Stop that noise,” I cried in French, angered beyond all reason
at the thought of music at such a time. "Idiots, there is yellow
fever there.”
The little man stopped with his bow raised; for a moment they
all stared at me, transfixed. It was a little elf in blue indienne
who jumped first and ran down the street, crying the news in a
shrill voice, the others following, the fiddler gazing stupidly
after them. Suddenly he scrambled up, moaning, as if the scourge
itself had fastened on him, backed into the house, and slammed the
door in my face. I returned with slow steps to shut myself in the
darkened room again, and I recall feeling something of triumph
over the consternation I had caused. No sounds came from the
bedroom, and after that the street was quiet as death save for an
occasional frightened, hurrying footfall. I was tired.
All at once the bedroom door opened softly, and Hélène was
standing there, looking at me. At first I saw her dimly, as in a
vision, then clearly. I leaped to my feet and went and stood
beside her.
“The doctor has not come,” I said. "Where does he live? I will
go for him.”
She shook her head.
“He can do no good. Lindy has procured all the remedies, such as
they are. They can only serve to alleviate,” she answered. "She
cannot withstand this, poor lady.” There were tears on Hélène’s
lashes. "Her sufferings have been frightful — frightful.”
“Cannot I help?” I said thickly. "Cannot I do something?”
She shook her head. She raised her hand timidly to the lapel of
my coat, and suddenly I felt her palm, cool and firm, upon my
forehead. It rested there but an instant.
“You ought not to be here,” she said, her voice vibrant with
earnestness and concern. "You ought not to be here. Will you not
go — if I ask it?”
“I cannot,” I said; "you know I cannot if you stay.”
She did not answer that. Our eyes met, and in that instant for
me there was neither joy nor sorrow, sickness nor death, nor time
nor space nor universe. It was she who turned away.
“Have you written him?” she asked in a low voice.
“Yes,” I answered.
“She would not have known him,” said Hélène; "after all these
years of waiting she would not have known him. Her punishment has
been great.”
A sound came from the bedroom, and Hélène was gone, silently, as
she had come.
I must have been dozing in the fauteuil, for suddenly I found
myself sitting up, listening to an unwonted noise. I knew from the
count of the hoof-beats which came from down the street that a
horse was galloping in long strides — a spent horse, for the timing
was irregular. Then he was pulled up into a trot, then to a walk
as I ran to the door and opened it and beheld Nicholas Temple
flinging himself from a pony white with lather. And he was alone!
He caught sight of me as soon as his foot touched the banquette.
“What are you doing here?” I cried. "What are you doing here?”
He halted on the edge of the banquette as a hurrying man runs
into a wall. He had been all excitement, all fury, as he jumped
from his horse; and now, as he looked at me, he seemed to lose his
bearings, to be all bewilderment. He cried out my name and stood
looking at me like a fool.
“What the devil do you mean by coming here?” I cried. "Did I not
write you to stay where you were? How did you get here?” I stepped
down on the banquette and seized him by the shoulders. "Did you
receive my letter?”
“Yes,” he said, “yes.” For a moment that was as far as he got,
and he glanced down the street and then at the heaving beast he
had ridden, which stood with head drooping to the kennel. Then he
laid hold of me. "Davy, is it true that she has yellow fever? Is
it true?”
“Who told you?” I demanded angrily.
“Andreacute;,” he answered. "Andreacute; said that the lady here had yellow
fever. Is it true?”
“Yes,” I said almost inaudibly.
He let his hand fall from my shoulder, and he shivered.
“May God forgive me for what I have done!” he said. "Where is
she?”
“For what you have done?” I cried; "you have done an insensate
thing to come here.” Suddenly I remembered the sentry at the gate
of Fort St. Charles. "How did you get into the city?” I said;
"were you mad to defy the Baron and his police?”
“Damn the Baron and his police,” he answered, striving to pass
me. "Let me in! Let me see her.”
Even as he spoke I caught sight of men coming into the street,
perhaps at the corner of the Rue St. Pierre, and then more men,
and as we went into the house I saw that they were running. I
closed the doors. There were cries in the street now, but he did
not seem to heed them. He stood listening, heart-stricken, to the
sounds that came through the bedroom wall, and a spasm crossed his
face. Then he turned like a man not to be denied, to the bedroom
door. I was before him, but Madame la Vicomtesse opened it. And I
remember feeling astonishment that she did not show surprise or
alarm.
“What are you doing here, Mr. Temple?” she said.
“My mother, Madame! My mother! I must go to her.”
He pushed past her into the bedroom, and I followed perforce. I
shall never forget the scene, though I had but the one glimpse of
it, — the raving, yellowed woman in the bed, not a spectre nor yet
even a semblance of the beauty of Temple Bow. But she was his
mother, upon whom God had brought such a retribution as He alone
can bestow. Lindy, faithful servant to the end, held the wasted
hands of her mistress against the violence they would have done.
Lindy held them, her own body rocking with grief, her lips
murmuring endearments, prayers, supplications.
“Miss Sally, honey, doan you know Lindy? Gawd’ll let you git
well, Miss Sally, Gawd’ll let you git well, honey, ter see Marse
Nick — ter see — Marse — Nick — "
The words died on Lindy’s lips, the ravings of the frenzied
woman ceased. The yellowed hands fell limply to the sheet, the
shrunken form stiffened. The eyes of the mother looked upon the
son, and in them at first was the terror of one who sees the
infinite. Then they softened until they became again the only
feature that was left of Sarah Temple. Now, as she looked at him
who was her pride, her honor, for one sight of whom she had
prayed, — ay, and even blasphemed, — her eyes were all tenderness.
Then she spoke.
“Harry,” she said softly, “be good to me, dear. You are all I
have now.”
She spoke of Harry Riddle!
But the long years of penance had not been in vain. Nick had
forgiven her. We saw him kneeling at the bedside, we saw him with
her hand in his, and Hélène was drawing me gently out of the room
and closing the door behind her. She did not look at me, nor I at
her.
We stood for a moment close together, and suddenly the cries in
the street brought us back from the drama in the low-ceiled,
reeking room we had left.
“Ici! Ici! Voici le cheval!”
There was a loud rapping at the outer door, and a voice
demanding admittance in Spanish in the name of his Excellency the
Governor.
“Open it,” said Hélène. There was neither excitement in her
voice, nor yet resignation. In those two words was told the
philosophy of her life.
I opened the door. There, on the step, was an officer,
perspiring, uniformed and plumed, and behind him a crowd of eager
faces, white and black, that seemed to fill the street. He took a
step into the room, his hand on the hilt of his sword, and poured
out at me a torrent of Spanish of which I understood nothing. All
at once his eye fell upon Hélène, who was standing behind me, and
he stopped in the middle of his speech and pulled off his hat and
bowed profoundly.
“Madame la Vicomtesse!” he stammered. I was no little surprised
that she should be so well known.
“You will please to speak French, Monsieur,” she said; "this
gentleman does not understand Spanish. What is it you desire?”
“A thousand pardons, Madame la Vicomtesse,” he said. "I am the
Alcalde de Barrio, and a wild Americano has passed the sentry at
St. Charles’s gate without heeding his Excellency’s authority and
command. I saw the man with my own eyes. I should know him again
in a hundred. We have traced him here to this house, Madame la
Vicomtesse. Behold the horse which he rode!” The Alcalde turned
and pointed at the beast. "Behold the horse which he rode, Madame
la Vicomtesse. The animal will die.”
“Probably,” answered the Vicomtesse, in an even tone.
“But the man,” cried the Alcalde, “the man is here, Madame la
Vicomtesse, here, in this house!”
“Yes,” she said, “he is here.”
“Sancta Maria! Madame,” he exclaimed, “I — I who speak to you have
come to get him. He has defied his Excellency’s commands. Where is
he?”
“He is in that room,” said the Vicomtesse, pointing at the
bedroom door.
The Alcalde took a step forward. She stopped him by a quick
gesture.
“He is in that room with his mother,” she said, “and his mother
has the yellow fever. Come, we will go to him.” And she put her
hand upon the door.
“Yellow fever!” cried the Alcalde, and his voice was thick with
terror. There was a moment’s silence as he stood rooted to the
floor. I did not wonder then, but I have since thought it
remarkable that the words spoken low by both of them should have
been caught up on the banquette and passed into the street.
Impassive, I heard it echoed from a score of throats, I saw men
and women stampeding like frightened sheep, I heard their
footfalls and their cries as they ran. A tawdry constable, who
held with a trembling hand the bridle of the tired horse, alone
remained.
“Yellow fever!” the Alcalde repeated
The Vicomtesse inclined her head.
He was silent again for a while, uncertain, and then, without
comprehending, I saw the man’s eyes grow smaller and a smile play
about his mouth. He looked at the Vicomtesse with a new admiration
to which she paid no heed.
“I am sorry, Madame la Vicomtesse,” he began, “but — "
“But you do not believe that I speak the truth,” she replied
quietly.
He winced.
“Will you follow me?” she said, turning again.
He had started, plainly in an agony of fear, when a sound came
from beyond the wall that brought a cry to his lips.
Her manner changed to one of stinging scorn.
“You are a coward,” she said. "I will bring the gentleman to you
if he can be got to leave the bedside.”
“No,” said the Alcalde, “no. I — I will go to him, Madame la
Vicomtesse.”
But she did not open the door.
“Listen,” she said in a tone of authority, “I myself have been
to his Excellency to-day concerning this gentleman — "
“You, Madame la Vicomtesse?”
“I will open the door,” she continued, impatient at the
interruption, “and you will see him. Then I shall write a letter
which you will take to the Governor. The gentleman will not try to
escape, for his mother is dying. Besides, he could not get out of
the city. You may leave your constable where he is, or the man may
come in and stand at this door in sight of the gentleman while you
are gone — if he pleases.”
“And then?” said the Alcalde.
“It is my belief that his Excellency will allow the gentleman to
remain here, and that you will be relieved from the necessity of
running any further risk.”
As she spoke she opened the door, softly. The room was still
now, still as death, and the Alcalde went forward on tiptoe. I saw
him peering in, I saw him backing away again like a man in mortal
fear.
“Yes, it is he — it is the man,” he stammered. He put his hand to
his brow.
The Vicomtesse closed the door, and without a glance at him went
quickly to the table and began to write. She had no thought of
consulting the man again, of asking his permission. Although she
wrote rapidly, five minutes must have gone by before the note was
finished and folded and sealed. She held it out to him.
“Take this to his Excellency,” she said, “and bring me his
answer.” The Alcalde bowed, murmured her title, and went lamely
out of the house. He was plainly in an agony of uncertainty as to
his duty, but he glanced at the Vicomtesse — and went, flipping the
note nervously with his finger nail. He paused for a few
low-spoken words with the tawdry constable, who sat down on the
banquette after his chief had gone, still clinging to the bridle.
The Vicomtesse went to the doorway, looked at him, and closed the
battened doors. The constable did not protest. The day was fading
without, and the room was almost in darkness as she crossed over
to the little mantel and stood with her head laid upon her arm.
I did not disturb her. The minutes passed, the light waned until
I could see her no longer, and yet I knew that she had not moved.
The strange sympathy between us kept me silent until I heard her
voice calling my name.
“Yes,” I answered.
“The candle!”
I drew out my tinder-box and lighted the wick. She had turned,
and was facing me even as she had faced me the night before. The
night before! The greatest part of my life seemed to have passed
since then. I remember wondering that she did not look tired. Her
face was sad, her voice was sad, and it had an ineffable, sweet
quality at such times that was all its own.
“The Alcalde should be coming back,” she said.
“Yes,” I answered.
These were our words, yet we scarce heeded their meaning.
Between us was drawn a subtler communion than speech, and we
dared — neither of us — to risk speech. She searched my face, but her
lips were closed. She did not take my hand again as in the
afternoon. She turned away. I knew what she would have said.
There was a knock at the door. We went together to open it, and
the Alcalde stood on the step. He held in his hand a long letter
on which the red seal caught the light, and he gave the letter to
the Vicomtesse, with a bow.
“From his Excellency, Madame la Vicomtesse.”
She broke the seal, went to the table, and read. Then she looked
up at me.
“It is the Governor’s permit for Mr. Temple to remain in this
house. Thank you,” she said to the Alcalde; "you may go.”
“With my respectful wishes for the continued good health of
Madame la Vicomtesse,” said the Alcalde.
CHAPTER XI.
“In the midst of life”
THE ALCALDE had stopped on the step with an exclamation at
something in the darkness outside, and he backed, bowing, into the
room again to make way for some one. A lady, slim, gowned and
veiled in black and followed by a negress, swept past him. The
lady lifted her veil and stood before us.
“Antoinette!” exclaimed the Vicomtesse, going to her.
The girl did not answer at once. Her suffering seemed to have
brought upon her a certain acceptance of misfortune as inevitable.
Her face, framed in the black veil, was never more beautiful than
on that night.
“What is the Alcalde doing here?” she said.
The officer himself answered the question.
“I am leaving, Mademoiselle,” said he. He reached out his hands
toward her, appealingly. "Do you not remember me, Mademoiselle?
You brought the good sister to see my wife.”
“I remember you,” said Antoinette.
“Do not stay here, Mademoiselle!” he cried. "There is — there is
yellow fever.”
“So that is it,” said Antoinette, unheeding him and looking at
her cousin. "She has yellow fever, then?”
“I beg you to come away, Mademoiselle!” the man entreated.
“Please go,” she said to him. He looked at her, and went out
silently, closing the doors after him. "Why was he here?” she
asked again.
“He came to get Mr. Temple, my dear,” said the Vicomtesse. The
girl’s lips framed his name, but did not speak it.
“Where is he?” she asked slowly.
The Vicomtesse pointed towards the bedroom.
“In there,” she answered, “with his mother.”
“He came to her?” Antoinette asked quite simply.
The Vicomtesse glanced at me, and drew the veil gently from the
girl’s shoulders. She led her, unresisting, to a chair. I looked
at them. The difference in their ages was not so great. Both had
suffered cruelly; one had seen the world, the other had not, and
yet the contrast lay not here. Both had followed the gospel of
helpfulness to others, but one as a religieuse, innocent of the
sin around her, though poignant of the sorrow it caused. The
other, knowing evil with an insight that went far beyond
intuition, fought with that, too.
“I will tell you, Antoinette,” began the Vicomtesse; "it was as
you said. Mr. Ritchie and I found him at Lamarque’s. He had not
taken your money; he did not even know that Auguste had gone to
see you. He did not even know,” she said, bending over the girl,
"that he was on your father’s plantation. When we told him that,
he would have left it at once.”
“Yes,” she said.
“He did not know that his mother was still in New Orleans. And
when we told him how ill she was he would have come to her then.
It was as much as we could do to persuade him to wait until we had
seen Monsieur de Carondelet. Mr. Ritchie and I came directly to
town and saw his Excellency.”
It was characteristic of the Vicomtesse that she told this
almost with a man’s brevity, that she omitted the stress and
trouble and pain of it all. These things were done; the tact and
skill and character of her who had accomplished them were not
spoken of. The girl listened immovable, her lips parted and her
eyes far away. Suddenly, with an awakening, she turned to Hélène.
“You did this!” she cried.
“Mr. Ritchie and I together,” said the Vicomtesse.
Her next exclamation was an odd one, showing how the mind works
at such a time.
“But his Excellency was having his siesta!” said Antoinette.
Again Hélène glanced at me, but I cannot be sure that she
smiled.
“We thought the matter of sufficient importance to awake his
Excellency,” said Hélène.
“And his Excellency?” asked Antoinette. In that moment all three
of us seemed to have forgotten the tragedy behind the wall.
“His Excellency thought so, too, when we had explained it
sufficiently,” Hélène answered.
The girl seemed suddenly to throw off the weight of her grief.
She seized the hand of the Vicomtesse in both of her own.
“The Baron pardoned him?” she cried. "Tell me what his
Excellency said. Why are you keeping it from me?”
“Hush, my dear,” said the Vicomtesse. "Yes, he pardoned him. Mr.
Temple was to have come to the city to-night with an officer. Mr.
Ritchie and I came to this house together, and we found — "
“Yes, yes,” said Antoinette.
“Mr. Ritchie wrote to Mr. Temple that his Excellency was to send
for him to-night, but Andreacute; told him of the fever, and he came
here in the face of danger to see her before she died. He galloped
past the sentry at the gate, and the Alcalde followed him from
there.”
“And came here to arrest him?” cried Antoinette. Before the
Vicomtesse could prevent her she sprang from her chair, ran to the
door, and was peering out into the darkness. "Is the Alcalde
waiting?”
“No, no,” said the Vicomtesse, gently bringing her back. "I
wrote to his Excellency and we have his permission for Mr. Temple
to remain here.”
Suddenly Antoinette stopped in the middle of the floor, facing
the candle, her hands clasped, her eyes wide with fear. We
started, Hélène and I, as we looked at her.
“What is it, my dear?” said the Vicomtesse, laying a hand on her
arm.
“He will take it,” she said, “he will take the fever.”
A strange thing happened. Many, many times have I thought of it
since, and I did not know its meaning then. I had looked to see
the Vicomtesse comfort her. But Hélène took a step towards me, my
eyes met hers, and in them reflected was the terror I had seen in
Antoinette’s. At that instant I, too, forgot the girl, and we
turned to see that she had sunk down, weeping, in the chair. Then
we both went to her, I through some instinct I did not fathom.
Hélène’s hand, resting on Antoinette’s shoulder, trembled there.
It may well have been my own weakness which made me think her body
swayed, which made me reach out as if to catch her. However
marvellous her strength and fortitude, these could not last
forever. And — Heaven help me — my own were fast failing. Once the
room had seemed to me all in darkness. Then I saw the Vicomtesse
leaning tenderly over her cousin and whispering in her ear, and
Antoinette rising, clinging to her.
“I will go,” she faltered, “I will go. He must not know I have
been here. You — you will not tell him?”
“No, I shall not tell him,” answered the Vicomtesse.
“And — you will send word to me, Hélène?”
“Yes, dear.”
Antoinette kissed her, and began to adjust her veil
mechanically. I looked on, bewildered by the workings of the
feminine mind. Why was she going? The Vicomtesse gave me no hint.
But suddenly the girl’s arms fell to her sides, and she stood
staring, not so much as a cry escaping her. The bedroom doors had
been opened, and between them was the tall figure of Nicholas
Temple. So they met again after many years, and she who had parted
them had brought them together once more. He came a step into the
room, as though her eyes had drawn him so far. Even then he did
not speak her name.
“Go,” he said. "Go, you must not stay here. Go!”
She bowed her head.
“I was going,” she answered. "I — I am going.”
“But you must go at once,” he cried excitedly. "Do you know what
is in there?” and he pointed towards the bedroom.
“Yes, yes, I know,” she said, “I know.”
“Then go,” he cried. "As it is you have risked too much.”
She lifted up her head and looked at him. There was a new-born
note in her voice, a tremulous note of joy in the midst of sorrow.
It was of her he was thinking!
“And you?” she said. "You have come and remained.”
“She is my mother,” he answered. "God knows it was the least I
could have done.”
Twice she had changed before our eyes, and now we beheld a new
and yet more startling transformation. When she spoke there was no
reproach in her voice, but triumph. Antoinette undid her veil.
“Yes, she is your mother,” she answered; "but for many years she
has been my friend. I will go to her. She cannot forbid me now.
Hélène has been with her,” she said, turning to where the
Vicomtesse stood watching her intently. "Hélène has been with her.
And shall I, who have longed to see her these many years, leave
her now?”
“But you were going!” he cried, beside himself with apprehension
at this new turning. "You told me that you were going.”
Truly, man is born without perception.
“Yes, I told you that,” she replied almost defiantly.
“And why were you going?” he demanded. Then I had a sudden
desire to shake him.
Antoinette was mute.
“You yourself must find the answer to that question, Mr.
Temple,” said the Vicomtesse, quietly.
He turned and stared at Hélène, and she seemed to smile. Then as
his eyes went back, irresistibly, to the other, a light that was
wonderful to see dawned and grew in them. I shall never forget him
as he stood, handsome and fearless, a gentleman still, despite his
years of wandering and adventure, and in this supreme moment
unselfish. The wilful, masterful boy had become a man at last.
He started forward, stopped, trembling with a shock of
remembrance, and gave back again.
“You cannot come,” he said; "I cannot let you take this risk.
Tell her she cannot come, Madame,” he said to Hélène. "For the
love of God send her home again.”
But there were forces which even Hélène could not stem. He had
turned to go back, he had seized the door, but Antoinette was
before him. Custom does not weigh at such a time. Had she not read
his avowal? She had his hand in hers, heedless of us who watched.
At first he sought to free himself, but she clung to it with all
the strength of her love, — yet she did not look up at him.
“I will come with you,” she said in a low voice, “I will come
with you, Nick.”
How quaintly she spoke his name, and gently, and timidly — ay, and
with a supreme courage. True to him through all those numb years
of waiting, this was a little thing — that they should face death
together. A little thing, and yet the greatest joy that God can
bestow upon a good woman. He looked down at her with a great
tenderness, he spoke her name, and I knew that he had taken her at
last into his arms.
“Come,” he said.
They went in together, and the doors closed behind them.
Antoinette’s maid was on the step, and the Vicomtesse and I were
alone once more in the little parlor. I remember well the sense of
unreality I had, and how it troubled me. I remember how what I had
seen and heard was turning, turning in my mind. Nick had come back
to Antoinette. They were together in that room, and Mrs. Temple
was dying — dying. No, it could not be so. Again, I was in the
garden at Les Iles on a night that was all perfume, and I saw the
flowers all ghostly white under the moon. And then, suddenly, I
was watching the green candle sputter, and out of the stillness
came a cry — the sereno calling the hour of the night. How my head
throbbed! It was keeping time to some rhythm, I knew not what.
Yes, it was the song my father used to sing: —
“I’ve faught on land? I’ve faught at sea,
At hume I’ve faught my aunty, O!”
But New Orleans was hot, burning hot, and this could not be cold
I felt. Ah, I had it, the water was cold going to Vincennes, so
cold!
A voice called me. No matter where I had gone, I think I would
have come back at the sound of it. I listened intently, that I
might lose no word of what it said. I knew the voice. Had it not
called to me many times in my life before? But now there was fear
in it, and fear gave it a vibrant sweetness, fear gave it a
quality that made it mine — mine.
“You are shivering.”
That was all it said, and it called from across the sea. And the
sea was cold, — cold and green under the gray light. If she who
called to me would only come with the warmth of her love! The sea
faded, the light fell, and I was in the eternal cold of space
between the whirling worlds. If she could but find me! Was not
that her hand in mine? Did I not feel her near me, touching me? I
wondered that I should hear myself as I answered her.
“I am not ill,” I said. "Speak to me again.”
She was pressing my hand now, I saw her bending over me, I felt
her hair as it brushed my face. She spoke again. There was a
tremor in her voice, and to that alone I listened. The words were
decisive, of command, and with them some sense as of a haven near
came to me. Another voice answered in a strange tongue, saying
seemingly: —
“Oui, Madame — malé couri — bon djé — malé couri!”
I heard the doors close, and the sound of footsteps running and
dying along the banquette, and after that my shoulders were raised
and something wrapped about them. Then stillness again, the
stillness that comes between waking and sleeping, between pain and
calm. And at times when I felt her hand fall into mine or press
against my brow, the pain seemed more endurable. After that I
recall being lifted, being borne along. I opened my eyes once and
saw, above a tile-crowned wall, the moon all yellow and distorted
in the sky. Then a gate clicked, dungeon blackness, half-light
again, ascent, oblivion.
CHAPTER XII.
visions, and an awakening
I HAVE still sharp memories of the tortures of that illness,
though it befell so long ago. At times, when my mind was gone from
me, I cried out I know not what of jargon, of sentiment, of the
horrors I had beheld in my life. I lived again the pleasant
scenes, warped and burlesqued almost beyond cognizance, and the
tragedies were magnified a hundred fold. Thus it would be: on the
low, white ceiling five cracks came together, and that was a
device. And the device would take on color, red-bronze like the
sumach in the autumn and streaks of vermilion, and two glowing
coals that were eyes, and above them eagles’ feathers, and the
cracks became bramble bushes. I was behind the log, and at times I
started and knew that it was a hideous dream, and again Polly Ann
was clutching me and praying me to hold back, and I broke from her
and splashed over the slippery limestone bed of the creek to fight
single-handed. Through all the fearful struggle I heard her
calling me piteously to come back to her. When the brute got me
under water I could not hear her, but her voice came back suddenly
(as when a door opens) and it was like the wind singing in the
poplars. Was it Polly Ann’s voice?
Again, I sat with Nick under the trees on the lawn at Temple
Bow, and the world was dark with the coming storm. I knew and he
knew that the storm was brewing that I might be thrust out into
it. And then in the blackness, when the air was filled with all
the fair things of the earth torn asunder, a beautiful woman came
through the noise and the fury, and we ran to her and clung to her
skirts, thinking we had found safety. But she thrust us forth into
the blackness with a smile, as though she were flinging papers out
of the window. She, too, grew out of the design in the cracks of
the ceiling, and a greater fear seized me at sight of her features
than when the red face came out of the brambles.
My constant torment was thirst. I was in the prairie, and it was
scorched and brown to the horizon. I searched and prayed pitifully
for water, — for only a sip of the brown water with the specks in it
that was in the swamp. There were no swamps. I was on the bed in
the cabin looking at the shifts and hunting shirts on the pegs,
and Polly Ann would bring a gourdful of clear water from the
spring as far as the door. Nay, once I got it to my lips, and it
was gone. Sometimes a young man in a hunting shirt,
square-shouldered, clear-eyed, his face tanned and his fair hair
bleached by the sun, would bring the water. He was the hero of my
boyhood, and part of him indeed was in me. And I would have
followed him again to Vincennes despite the tortures of the
damned. But when I spoke his name he grew stouter before me, and
his eyes lost their lustre and his hair turned gray; and his hand
shook as he held out the gourd and spilled its contents ere I
could reach them.
Sometimes another brought the water, and at sight of her I would
tremble and grow faint, and I had not the strength to reach for
it. She would look at me with eyes that laughed despite the
resolution of the mouth. Then the eyes would grow pitiful at my
helplessness, and she would murmur my name. There was some reason
which I never fathomed why she could not give me the water, and
her own suffering seemed greater than mine because of it. So great
did it seem that I forgot my own and sought to comfort her. Then
she would go away, very slowly, and I would hear her calling to me
in the wind, from the stars to which I looked up from the prairie.
It was she, I thought, who ordered the world. Who, when women were
lost and men cried out in distress, came to them calmly,
ministered to them deftly.
Once — perhaps a score of times, I cannot tell — was limned on the
ceiling, where the cracks were, her miniature, and I knew what was
coming and shuddered and cried aloud because I could not stop it.
I saw the narrow street of a strange city deep down between high
houses, — houses with gratings on the lowest windows, with studded,
evil-looking doors, with upper stories that toppled over to shut
out the light of the sky, with slated roofs that slanted and
twisted this way and that and dormers peeping from them. Down in
the street, instead of the King’s white soldiers, was a foul,
unkempt rabble, creeping out of its damp places, jesting, cursing,
singing. And in the midst of the rabble a lady sat in a cart high
above it unmoved. She was the lady of the miniature. A window in
one of the jutting houses was flung open, a little man leaned out
excitedly, and I knew him too. He was Jean Baptiste Lenoir, and he
cried out in a shrill voice: —
“You must take off her ruff, citizens. You must take off her
ruff!”
There came a blessed day when my thirst was gone, when I looked
up at the cracks in the ceiling and wondered why they did not
change into horrors. I watched them a long, long time, and it
seemed incredible that they should still remain cracks. Beyond
that I would not go, into speculation I dared not venture. They
remained cracks, and I went to sleep thanking God. When I awoke a
breeze came in cool, fitful gusts, and on it the scent of
camellias. I thought of turning my head, and I remember wondering
for a long time over the expediency of this move. What would
happen if I did! Perhaps the visions would come back, perhaps my
head would come off. Finally I decided to risk it, and the first
thing that I beheld was a palm-leaf fan, moving slowly. That fact
gave me food for thought, and contented me for a while. Then I hit
upon the idea that there must be something behind the fan. I was
distinctly pleased by this astuteness, and I spent more time in
speculation. Whatever it was, it had a tantalizing elusiveness,
keeping the fan between it and me. This was not fair.
I had an inspiration. If I feigned to be asleep, perhaps the
thing behind the fan would come out. I shut my eyes. The breeze
continued steadily. Surely no human being could fan as long as
that without being tired! I opened my eyes twice, but the thing
was inscrutable. Then I heard a sound that I knew to be a footstep
upon boards. A voice whispered: —
“The delirium has left him.”
Another voice, a man’s voice, answered: —
“Thank God! Let me fan him. You are tired.”
“I am not tired,” answered the first voice.
“I do not see how you have stood it,” said the man’s voice. "You
will kill yourself, Madame la Vicomtesse. The danger is past now.”
“I hope so, Mr. Temple,” said the first voice. "Please go away.
You may come back in half an hour.”
I heard the footsteps retreating. Then I said: "I am not
asleep.”
The fan stopped for a brief instant and then went on vibrating
inexorably. I was entranced at the thought of what I had done. I
had spoken, though indeed it seemed to have had no effect. Could
it be that I hadn’t spoken? I began to be frightened at this, when
gradually something crept into my mind and drove the fear out. I
did not grasp what this was at first, it was like the first
staining of wine on the eastern sky to one who sees a sunrise. And
then the thought grew even as the light grows, tinged by prismatic
colors, until at length a memory struck into my soul like a shaft
of light. I spoke her name, unblushingly, aloud.
“Hélène!”
The fan stopped. There was a silence that seemed an eternity as
the palm leaf trembled in her hand, there was an answer that
strove tenderly to command.
“Hush, you must not talk,” she said.
Never, I believe, came such supreme happiness with obedience. I
felt her hand upon my brow, and the fan moved again. I fell asleep
once more from sheer weariness of joy. She was there, beside me.
She had been there, beside me, through it all, and it was her
touch which had brought me back to life.
I dreamed of her. When I awoke again her image was in my mind,
and I let it rest there in contemplation. But presently I thought
of the fan, turned my head, and it was not there. A great fear
seized me. I looked out of the open door where the morning sun
threw the checkered shadows of the honeysuckle on the floor of the
gallery, and over the railing to the tree-tops in the court-yard.
The place struck a chord in my memory. Then my eyes wandered back
into the room. There was a polished dresser, a crucifix and a
prie-dieu in the corner, a fauteuil, and another chair at my bed.
The floor was rubbed to an immaculate cleanliness, stained yellow,
and on it lay clean woven mats. The room was empty!
I cried out, a yellow and red turban shot across the window, and
I beheld in the door the spare countenance of the faithful Lindy.
“Marse Dave,” she cried, “is you feelin’ well, honey?”
“Where am I, Lindy?” I asked.
Lindy, like many of her race, knew well how to assume airs of
importance. Lindy had me down, and she knew it.
“Marse Dave,” she said, “doan yo’ know better’n dat? Yo’ know
yo’ ain’t ter talk. Lawsy, I reckon I wouldn’t be wuth pizen if
she was to hear I let yo’ talk.”
Lindy implied that there was tyranny somewhere.
“She?” I asked, “who’s she?”
“Now yo’ hush, Marse Dave,” said Lindy, in a shrill whisper, “I
ain’t er-gwine ter git mixed up in no disputation. Ef she was ter
hear me er-disputin’ wid yo’, Marse Dave, I reckon I’d done git
such er tongue-lashin’ — " Lindy looked at me suspiciously. "Yo’-er
allus was powe’rful cute, Marse Dave.”
Lindy set her lips with a mighty resolve to be silent. I heard
some one coming along the gallery, and then I saw Nick’s tall
figure looming up behind her.
“Davy,” he cried.
Lindy braced herself up doggedly.
“Yo’ ain’t er-gwine to git in thar nohow, Marse Nick,” she said.
“Nonsense, Lindy,” he answered, “I’ve been in there as much as
you have.” And he took hold of her thin arm and pulled her back.
“Marse Nick!” she cried, terror-stricken, “she’ll done fin’ out
dat you’ve been er-talkin’.”
“Pish!” said Nick with a fine air, “who’s afraid of her?”
Lindy’s face took on an expression of intense amusement.
“Yo’ is, for one, Marse Nick,” she answered, with the
familiarity of an old servant. "I done seed yo’ skedaddle when she
comed.”
“Tut,” said Nick, grandly, “I run from no woman. Eh, Davy?” He
pushed past the protesting Lindy into the room and took my hand.
“Egad, you have been near the devil’s precipice, my son. A
three-bottle man would have gone over.” In his eyes was all the
strange affection he had had for me ever since ave had been boys
at Temple Bow together. "Davy, I reckon life wouldn’t have been
worth much if you’d gone.”
I did not answer. I could only stare at him, mutely grateful for
such an affection. In all his wild life he had been true to me,
and he had clung to me stanchly in this, my greatest peril.
Thankful that he was here, I searched his handsome person with my
eyes. He was dressed as usual, with care and fashion, in linen
breeches and a light gray coat and a filmy ruffle at his neck. But
I thought there had come a change into his face. The reckless
quality seemed to have gone out of it, yet the spirit and daring
remained, and with these all the sweetness that was once in his
smile. There were lines under his eyes that spoke of vigils.
“You have been sitting up with me,” I said.
“Of course,” he answered patting my shoulder. "Of course I have.
What did you think I would be doing?”
“What was the matter with me?” I asked.
“Nothing much,” he said lightly, “a touch of the sun, and a
great deal of overwork in behalf of your friends. Now keep still,
or I will be getting peppered.”
I was silent for a while, turning over this answer in my mind.
Then I said: —
“I had yellow fever.”
He started.
“It is no use to lie to you,” he replied; "you’re too shrewd.”
I was silent again for a while.
“Nick,” I said, “you had no right to stay here. You have — other
responsibilities now.”
He laughed. It was the old buoyant, boyish laugh of sheer
happiness, and I felt the better for hearing it.
“If you begin to preach, parson, I’ll go; I vow I’ll have no
more sermonizing. Davy,” he cried, “isn’t she just the dearest,
sweetest, most beautiful person in the world?”
“Where is she?” I asked, temporizing. Nick was not a subtle
person, and I was ready to follow him at great length in the
praise of Antoinette. "I hope she is not here.”
“We made her go to Les Iles,” said he.
“And you risked your life and stayed here without her?” I said.
“As for risking life, that kind of criticism doesn’t come well
from you. And as for Antoinette,” he added with a smile, “I expect
to see something of her later on.”
“Well,” I answered with a sigh of supreme content, “you have
been a fool all your life, and I hope that she will make you
sensible.”
“You never could make me so,” said Nick, “and besides, I don’t
think you’ve been so damned sensible yourself.”
We were silent again for a space.
“Davy,” he asked, “do you remember what I said when you had that
miniature here?”
“You said a great many things, I believe.”
“I told you to consider carefully the masterful features of that
lady, and to thank God you hadn’t married her. I vow I never
thought she’d turn up. Upon my oath I never thought I should be
such a blind slave as I have been for the last fortnight. Faith,
Monsieur de St. Gré is a strong man, but he was no more than a
puppet in his own house when he came back here for a day. That
lady could govern a province, — no, a kingdom. But I warrant you
there would be no climbing of balconies in her dominions. I have
never been so generalled in my life.”
I had no answer for these comments.
“The deuce of it is the way she does it,” he continued, plainly
bent on relieving himself. "There’s no noise, no fuss; but you
must obey, you don’t know why. And yet you may flay me if I don’t
love her.”
“Love her!” I repeated.
“She saved your life,” said Nick; "I don’t believe any other
woman could have done it. She hadn’t any thought of her own. She
has been here, in this room, almost constantly night and day, and
she never let you go. The little French doctor gave you up — not
she. She held on. Cursed if I see why she did it.”
“Nor I,” I answered.
“Well,” he said apologetically, “of course I would have done it,
but you weren’t anything to her. Yes, egad, you were something to
be saved, — that was all that was necessary. She had you brought
back here — we are in Monsieur de St. Gré’s house, by the way — in a
litter, and she took command as though she had nursed yellow fever
cases all her life. No flurry. I said that you were in love with
her once, Davy, when I saw you looking at the portrait. I take it
back. Of course a man could be very fond of her,” he said, “but a
king ought to have married her. As for that poor Vicomte she’s
tied up to, I reckon I know the reason why he didn’t come to
America. An ordinary man would have no chance at all. God bless
her!” he cried, with a sudden burst of feeling, “I would die for
her myself. She got me out of a barrel of trouble with his
Excellency. She cared for my mother, a lonely outcast, and braved
death herself to go to her when she was dying of the fever. God
bless her!”
Lindy was standing in the doorway.
“Lan’ sakes, Marse Nick, yo’ gotter go,” she said.
He rose and pressed my fingers. "I’ll go,” he said, and left me.
Lindy seated herself in the chair. She held in her hand a bowl of
beef broth. From this she fed me in silence, and when she left she
commanded me to sleep informing me that she would be on the
gallery within call.
But I did not sleep at once. Nick’s words had brought back a
fact which my returning consciousness had hitherto ignored. The
birds sang in the court-yard, and when the breeze stirred it was
ever laden with a new scent. I had been snatched from the jaws of
death, my life was before me, but the happiness which had thrilled
me was gone, and in my weakness the weight of the sadness which
had come upon me was almost unbearable. If I had had the strength,
I would have risen then and there from my bed, I would have fled
from the city at the first opportunity. As it was, I lay in a
torture of thought, living over again every part of my life which
she had touched. I remembered the first long, yearning look I had
given the miniature at Madame Bouvet’s. I had not loved her then.
My feeling rather had been a mysterious sympathy with and
admiration for this brilliant lady whose sphere was so far removed
from mine. This was sufficiently strange. Again, in the years of
my struggle for livelihood which followed, I dreamed of her; I
pictured her often in the midst of the darkness of the Revolution.
Then I had the miniature again, which had travelled to her, as it
were, and come back to me. Even then it was not love I felt but an
unnamed sentiment for one whom I clothed with gifts and attributes
I admired: constancy, an ability to suffer and to hide, decision,
wit, refuge for the weak, scorn for the false. So I named them at
random and cherished them, knowing that these things were not what
other men longed for in women. Nay, there was another quality
which I believed was there — which I knew was there — a supreme
tenderness that was hidden like a treasure too sacred to be seen.
I did not seek to explain the mystery which had brought her
across the sea into that little garden of Mrs. Temple’s and into
my heart. There she was now enthroned, deified; that she would
always be there I accepted. That I would never say or do anything
not in consonance with her standards I knew. That I would suffer
much I was sure, but the lees of that suffering I should hoard
because they came from her.
What might have been I tried to put away. There was the moment,
I thought, when our souls had met in the little parlor in the Rue
Bourbon. I should never know. This I knew — that we had labored
together to bring happiness into other lives.
Then came another thought to appall me. Unmindful of her own
safety, she had nursed me back to life through all the horrors of
the fever. The doctor had despaired, and I knew that by the very
force that was in her she had saved me. She was here now, in this
house, and presently she would be coming back to my bedside.
Painfully I turned my face to the wall in a torment of
humiliation — I had called her by her name. I would see her again,
but I knew not whence the strength for that ordeal was to come.
I KNEW by the light that it was evening when I awoke. So
prisoners mark the passing of the days by a bar of sun light. And
as I looked at the green trees in the courtyard, vaguely troubled
by I knew not what, some one came and stood in the doorway. It was
Nick.
“You don’t seem very cheerful,” said he; "a man ought to be who
has been snatched out of the fire.”
“You seem to be rather too sure of my future,” I said, trying to
smile.
“That’s more like you,” said Nick. "Egad, you ought to be
happy — we all ought to be happy — she’s gone.”
“She!” I cried. "Who’s gone?”
“Madame la Vicomtesse,” he replied, rubbing his hands as he
stood over me. "But she’s left instructions with me for Lindy as
long as Monsieur de Carondelet’s Bando de Buen Gobierno. You are
not to do this, and you are not to do that, you are to eat such
and such things, you are to be made to sleep at such and such
times. She came in here about an hour ago and took a long look at
you before she left.”
“She was not ill?” I said faintly.
“Faith, I don’t know why she was not,” he said. "She has done
enough to tire out an army. But she seems well and fairly happy.
She had her joke at my expense as she went through the court-yard,
and she reminded me that we were to send a report by Andreacute; every
day.”
Chagrin, depression, relief, bewilderment, all were struggling
within me.
“Where did she go?” I asked at last.
“To Les Iles,” he said. "You are to be brought there as soon as
you are strong enough.”
“Do you happen to know why she went?” I said.
“Now how the deuce should I know?” he answered. "I’ve done
everything with blind servility since I came into this house. I
never asked for any reason — it never would have done any good. I
suppose she thought that you were well on the road to recovery,
and she knew that Lindy was an old hand. And then the doctor is to
come in.”
“Why didn’t you go?” I demanded, with a sudden remembrance that
he was staying away from happiness.
“It was because I longed for another taste of liberty, Davy,” he
laughed. "You and I will have an old-fashioned time here
together, — a deal of talk, and perhaps a little piquet, — who knows?”
My strength came back, bit by bit, and listening to his
happiness did much to ease the soreness of my heart — while the
light lasted. It was in the night watches that my struggles
came — though often some unwitting speech of his would bring back
the pain. He took delight in telling me, for example, how for
hours at a time I had been in a fearful delirium.
“The Lord knows what foolishness you talked, Davy,” said he. "It
would have done me good to hear you had you been in your right
mind.”
“But you did hear me,” I said, full of apprehensions.
“Some of it,” said he. "You were after Wilkinson once, in a
burrow, I believe, and you swore dreadfully because he got out of
the other end. I can’t remember all the things you said. Oh, yes,
once you were talking to Auguste de St. Gré about money.”
“Money?” I repeated in a sinking voice.
“Oh, a lot of jargon.” The Vicomtesse pushed me out of the room,
and after that I was never allowed to be there when you had those
flights. Curse the mosquitoes! He seized a fan and began to ply it
vigorously. "I remember. You were giving Auguste a lecture. Then I
had to go.”
These and other reminiscences gave me sufficient food for
reflection, and many a shudder over the possibilities of my
ravings. She had put him out! No wonder.
After a while I was carried to the gallery, and there I would
talk to the little doctor about the yellow fever which had swept
the city. Monsieur Perrin was not much of a doctor, to be sure,
and he had a heartier dread of the American invasion than of the
scourge. He worshipped the Vicomtesse, and was so devoid of
professional pride as to give her freely all credit for my
recovery. He too, clothed her with the qualities of statesmanship.
“Ha, Monsieur,” he said, “if that lady had been King of France,
do you think there would have been any States General, any red
bonnets, any Jacobins or Cordeliers? Parbleu, she would have swept
the vicemongers and traitors out of the Palais Royal itself. There
would have been a house-cleaning there. I, who speak to you, know
it.”
Every day Nick wrote a bulletin to be sent to the Vicomtesse,
and he took a fiendish delight in the composition of these. He
would come out on the gallery with ink and a blank sheet of paper
and try to enlist my help. He would insert the most ridiculous
statements, as for instance, “Davy is worse to-day, having bribed
Lindy to give him a pint of Madeira against my orders.” Or, “Davy
feigns to be sinking rapidly because he wishes to have you back.”
Indeed, I was always in a torture of doubt to know what the rascal
had sent.
His company was most agreeable when he was recounting the many
adventures he had had during the five years after he had left New
Orleans and been lost to me. These would fill a book, and a most
readable book it would be if written in his own speech. His love
for the excitement of the frontier had finally drawn him back to
the Cumberland country near Nashville, and he had actually gone so
far as to raise a house and till some of the land which he had won
from Darnley. It was perhaps characteristic of him that he had
named the place "Rattle-and-Snap" in honor of the game which had
put him in possession of it, and "Rattle-and-Snap" it remains to
this day. He was going back there with Antoinette, so he said, to
build a brick mansion and to live a respectable life the rest of
his days.
There was one question which had been in my mind to ask him,
concerning the attitude of Monsieur de St. Gré. That gentleman,
with Madame, had hurried back from Pointe Coupee at a message from
the Vicomtesse, and had gone first to Les Iles to see Antoinette.
Then he had come, in spite of the fever, to his own house in New
Orleans to see Nick himself. What their talk had been I never
knew, for the subject was too painful to be dwelt upon, and the
conversation had been marked by frankness on both sides. Monsieur
de St. Gré was a just man, his love for his daughter was his chief
passion, and despite all that had happened he liked Nick. I
believe he could not wholly blame the younger man, and he forgave
him.
Mrs. Temple, poor lady, had died on that first night of my
illness, and it was her punishment that she had not known her son
or her son’s happiness. Whatever sins she had committed in her
wayward life were atoned for, and by her death I firmly believe
that she redeemed him. She lies now among the Temples in
Charleston, and on the stone which marks her grave is cut no line
that hints of the story of these pages.
One bright morning, when Nick and I were playing cards, we heard
some one mounting the stairs, and to my surprise and embarrassment
I beheld Monsieur de St. Gré emerging on the gallery. He was in
white linen and wore a broad hat, which he took from his head as
he advanced. He had aged somewhat, his hair was a little gray, but
otherwise he was the firm, dignified personage I had admired on
this same gallery five years before.
“Good morning, gentlemen,” he said in English; "ha, do not rise,
sir" (to me). He patted Nick’s shoulder kindly, but not
familiarly, as he passed him, and extended his hand.
“Mr. Ritchie, it gives me more pleasure than I can express to
see you so much recovered.”
“I am again thrown on your hospitality, sir,” I said, flushing
with pleasure at this friendliness. For I admired and respected
the man greatly. "And I fear I have been a burden and trouble to
you and your family.”
He took my hand and pressed it. Characteristically, he did not
answer this, and I remembered he was always careful not to say
anything which might smack of insincerity.
“I had a glimpse of you some weeks ago,” he said, thus making
light of the risk he had run. "You are a different man now. You
may thank your Scotch blood and your strong constitution.”
“His good habits have done him some good, after all,” put in my
irrepressible cousin.
Monsieur de St. Gré smiled.
“Nick,” he said (he pronounced the name quaintly, like
Antoinette), “his good habits have turned out to be some advantage
to you. Mr. Ritchie, you have a faithful friend at least.” He
patted Nick’s shoulder again. "And he has promised me to settle
down.”
“I have every inducement, sir,” said Nick.
Monsieur de St. Gré became grave.
“You have indeed, Monsieur,” he answered.
“I have just come from Dr. Perrin’s, David,” — he added, “May I
call you so? Well, then, I have just come from Dr. Perrin’s, and
he says you may be moved to Les Iles this very afternoon. Why,
upon my word,” he exclaimed, staring at me, “you don’t look
pleased. One would think you were going to the calabozo.”
“Ah,” said Nick, slyly, “I know. He has tasted freedom,
Monsieur, and Madame la Vicomtesse will be in command again.”
I flushed. Nick could be very exasperating.
“You must not mind him, Monsieur,” I said.
“I do not mind him,” answered Monsieur de St. Gré, laughing in
spite of himself. "He is a sad rogue. As for Hélène — "
“I shall not know how to thank the Vicomtesse,” I said. "She has
done me the greatest service one person can do another.”
“Hélène is a good woman,” answered Monsieur de St. Gré, simply.
"She is more than that, she is a wonderful woman. I remember
telling you of her once. I little thought then that she would ever
come to us.”
He turned to me. "Dr. Perrin will be here this afternoon, David,
and he will have you dressed. Between five and six if all goes
well, we shall start for Les Iles. And in the meantime,
gentlemen,” he added with a stateliness that was natural to him,
"I have business which takes me to-day to my brother-in-law’s,
Monsieur de Beausejour’s.”
Nick leaned over the gallery and watched meditatively his
prospective father-in-law leaving the court-yard.
“He got me out of a devilish bad scrape,” he said.
“How was that?” I asked listlessly.
“That fat little Baron, the Governor, was for deporting me for
running past the sentry and giving him all the trouble I did. It
seems that the Vicomtesse promised to explain matters in a note
which she wrote, and never did explain. She was here with you, and
a lot she cared about anything else. Lucky that Monsieur de St.
Gre came back. Now his Excellency graciously allows me to stay
here, if I behave myself, until I get married.”
I do not know how I spent the rest of the day. It passed,
somehow. If I had had the strength then, I believe I should have
fled. I was to see her again, to feel her near me, to hear her
voice. During the weeks that had gone by I had schooled myself, in
a sense, to the inevitable. I had not let my mind dwell upon my
visit to Les Iles, and now I was face to face with the struggle
for which I felt I had not the strength. I had fought one
battle, — I knew that a fiercer battle was to come.
In due time the doctor arrived, and while he prepared me for my
departure, the little man sought, with misplaced kindness, to
raise my spirits. Was not Monsieur going to the country, to a
paradise? Monsieur — so Dr. Perrin had noticed — had a turn for
philosophy. Could two more able and brilliant conversationalists
be found than Philippe de St. Gré and Madame la Vicomtesse? And
there was the happiness of that strange but lovable young man,
Monsieur Temple, to contemplate. He was in luck, ce beau garcon,
for he was getting an angel for his wife. Did Monsieur know that
Mademoiselle Antoinette was an angel?
At last I was ready, arrayed in my best, on the gallery, when
Monsieur de St. Gré came. Andreacute; and another servant carried me
down into the court, and there stood a painted sedan-chair with
the St. Gré arms on the panels.
“My father imported it, David,” said Monsieur de St. Gré. "It
has not been used for many years. You are to be carried in it to
the levee, and there I have a boat for you.”
Overwhelmed by this kindness, I could not find words to thank
him as I got into the chair. My legs were too long for it, I
remember. I had a quaint feeling of unreality as I sank back on
the red satin cushions and was borne out of the gate between the
lions. Monsieur de St. Gré and Nick walked in front, the faithful
Lindy followed, and people paused to stare at us as we passed. We
crossed the Place d’Armes, the Royal Road, gained the
willow-bordered promenade on the levee’s crown, and a wide barge
was waiting, manned by six negro oarsmen. They lifted me into its
stern under the awning, the barge was cast off, the oars dipped,
and we were gliding silently past the line of keel boats on the
swift current of the Mississippi. The spars of the shipping were
inky black, and the setting sun had struck a red band across the
waters. For a while the three of us sat gazing at the green shore,
each wrapped in his own reflections, — Philippe de St. Gré thinking,
perchance, of the wayward son he had lost; Nick of the woman who
awaited him; and I of one whom fate had set beyond me. It was
Monsieur de St. Gré who broke the silence at last.
“You feel no ill effects from your moving, David?” he asked,
with an anxious glance at me.
“None, sir,” I said.
“The country air will do you good,” he said kindly.
“And Madame la Vicomtesse will put him on a diet,” added Nick,
rousing himself.
“Hélène will take care of him,” answered Monsieur de St. Gré.
He fell to musing again. "Madame la Vicomtesse has seen more in
seven years than most of us see in a lifetime,” he said. "She has
beheld the glory of France, and the dishonor and pollution of her
country. Had the old order lasted her salon would have been
famous, and she would have been a power in politics.”
“I have thought that the Vicomtesse must have had a queer
marriage,” Nick remarked.
Monsieur de St. Gré smiled.
“Such marriages were the rule amongst our nobility,” he said.
"It was arranged while Hélène was still in the convent, though it
was not celebrated until three years after she had been in the
world. There was a romantic affair, I believe, with a young
gentleman of the English embassy, though I do not know the
details. He is said to be the only man she ever cared for. He was
a younger son of an impoverished earl.”
I started, remembering what the Vicomtesse had said. But
Monsieur de St. Gré did not appear to see my perturbation.
“Be that as it may, if Hélène suffered, she never gave a sign of
it. The marriage was celebrated with great pomp, and the world
could only conjecture what she thought of the Vicomte. It was
deemed on both sides a brilliant match. He had inherited vast
estates,
Ivry-le-Tour, Montméry, Les Saillantes, I know not what
else. She was heiress to the château de St. Gré with its wide
lands, to the château and lands of the Côte Rouge in Normandy, to
the hotel St. Gré in Paris. Monsieur le Vicomte was between forty
and fifty at his marriage, and from what I have heard of him he
had many of the virtues and many of the faults of his order. He
was a bachelor, which does not mean that he had lacked
consolations. He was reserved with his equals, and distant with
others. He had served in the Guards, and did not lack courage. He
dressed exquisitely, was inclined to the Polignac party, took his
ease everywhere, had a knowledge of cards and courts, and little
else. He was cheated by his stewards, refused to believe that the
Revolution was serious, and would undoubtedly have been
guillotined had the Vicomtesse not contrived to get him out of
France in spite of himself. They went first to the Duke de Ligne,
at Bel Oeil, and thence to Coblentz. He accepted a commission in
the Austrian service, which is much to his credit, and Hélène went
with some friends to England. There my letter reached her, and
rather than be beholden to strangers or accept my money there, she
came to us. That is her story in brief, Messieurs. As for Monsieur
le Vicomte, he admired his wife, as well he might, respected her
for the way she served the gallants, but he made no pretence of
loving her. One affair — a girl in the village of Montméry — had
lasted. Hélène was destined for higher things than may be found in
Louisiana,” said Monsieur de St. Gré, turning to Nick, “but now
that you are to carry away my treasure, Monsieur, I do not know
what I should have done without her.”
“And has there been any news of the Vicomte of late?”
It was Nick who asked the question, after a little. Monsieur de
St. Gré looked at him in surprise.
“Eh, mon Dieu, have you not heard?” he said. “C’est vrai, you
have been with David. Did not the Vicomtesse mention it? But why
should she? Monsieur le Vicomte died in Vienna. He had lived too
well.”
“The Vicomte is dead?” I said.
They both looked at me. Indeed, I should not have recognized my
own voice. What my face betrayed, what my feelings were, I cannot
say. My heart beat no faster, there was no tumult in my brain, and
yet — my breath caught strangely. Something grew within me which is
beyond the measure of speech, and so it was meant to be.
“I did not know this myself until Hélène returned to Les Iles,”
Monsieur de St. Gré was saying to me. "The letter came to her the
day after you were taken ill. It was from the Baron von
Seckenbruck, at whose house the Vicomte died. She took it very
calmly, for Hélène is not a woman to pretend. How much better,
after all, if she had married her Englishman for love! And she is
much troubled now because, as she declares, she is dependent upon
my bounty. That is my happiness, my consolation,” the good man
added simply, “and her father, the Marquis, was kind to me when I
was a young provincial and a stranger. God rest his soul!”
We were drawing near to Les Iles. The rains had come during my
illness, and in the level evening light the forest of the shore
was the tender green of spring. At length we saw the white wooden
steps in the levee at the landing, and near them were three
figures waiting. We glided nearer. One was Madame de St. Gré,
another was Antoinette, — these I saw indeed. The other was Hélène,
and it seemed to me that her eyes met mine across the waters and
drew them. Then we were at the landing. I heard Madame de St.
Gre’s voice, and Antoinette’s in welcome — I listened for another. I
saw Nick running up the steps; in the impetuosity of his love he
had seized Antoinette’s hand in his, and she was the color of a
red rose. Creole decorum forbade further advances. Andreacute; and
another lifted me out, and they gathered around me, — these kind
people and devoted friends, — Antoinette calling me, with exquisite
shyness, by name; Madame de St. Gré giving me a grave but gentle
welcome, and asking anxiously how I stood the journey. Another
took my hand, held it for the briefest space that has been marked
out of time, and for that instant I looked into her eyes. Life
flowed back into me, and strength, and a joy not to be fathomed. I
could have walked; but they bore me through the well-remembered
vista, and the white gallery at the end of it was like the sight
of home. The evening air was laden with the scent of the sweetest
of all shrubs and flowers.
CHAPTER XIV.
“to unpathed waters, undreamed shores”
MONSIEUR and Madame de St. Gré themselves came with me to my
chamber off the gallery, where everything was prepared for my
arrival with the most loving care, — Monsieur de St. Gré supplying
many things from his wardrobe which I lacked. And when I tried to
thank them for their kindness he laid his hand upon my shoulder.
“Tenez, mon ami,” he said, “you got your illness by doing things
for other people. It is time other people did something for you.”
Lindy brought me the daintiest of suppers, and I was left to my
meditations. Nick looked in at the door, and hinted darkly that I
had to thank a certain tyrant for my abandonment. I called to him,
but he paid no heed, and I heard him chuckling as he retreated
along the gallery. The journey, the excitement into which I had
been plunged by the news I had heard, brought on a languor, and I
was between sleeping and waking half the night. I slept to dream
of her, of the Vicomte, her husband, walking in his park or
playing cards amidst a brilliant company in a great candle-lit
room like the drawing-room at Temple Bow. Doubt grew, and sleep
left me. She was free now, indeed, but was she any nearer to me?
Hope grew again, — why had she left me in New Orleans? She had
received a letter, and if she had cared she would not have
remained. But there was a detestable argument to fit that
likewise, and in the light of this argument it was most natural
that she should return to Les Iles. And who was I, David Ritchie,
a lawyer of the little town of Louisville, to aspire to the love
of such a creature? Was it likely that Hélène, Vicomtesse
d’Ivry-le-Tour, would think twice of me? The powers of the world
were making ready to crush the presumptuous France of the
Jacobins, and the France of King and Aristocracy would be
restored. châteaux and lands would be hers again, and she would go
back again to that brilliant life among the great to which she was
born, for which nature had fitted her. Last of all was the thought
of the Englishman whom I resembled. She would go back to him.
Nick was the first in my room the next morning. He had risen
early (so he ingenuously informed me) because Antoinette had a
habit of getting up with the birds, and as I drank my coffee he
was emphatic in his denunciations of the customs of the country.
“It is a wonderful day, Davy,” he cried; "you must hurry and get
out. Monsieur de St. Gré sends his compliments, and wishes to know
if you will pardon his absence this morning. He is going to escort
Antoinette and me over to see some of my prospective cousins, the
Bertrands.” He made a face, and bent nearer to my ear. "I swear to
you I have not had one moment alone with her. We have been for a
walk, but Madame la Vicomtesse must needs intrude herself upon us.
Egad, I told her plainly what I thought of her tyranny.”
“And what did she say?” I asked, trying to smile.
“She laughed, and said that I belonged to a young nation which
had done much harm in the world to everybody but themselves.
Faith, if I wasn’t in love with Antoinette, I believe I’d be in
love with her.”
“I have no doubt of it,” I answered.
“The Vicomtesse is as handsome as a queen this morning,” he
continued, paying no heed to this remark. "She has on a linen
dress that puzzles me. It was made to walk among the trees and
flowers, it is as simple as you please; and yet it has a
distinction that makes you stare.”
“You seem to have stared,” I answered. "Since when did you take
such interest in gowns?”
“Bless you, it was Antoinette. I never should have known,” said
he. "Antoinette had never before seen the gown, and she asked the
Vicomtesse where she got the pattern. The Vicomtesse said that the
gown had been made by Leonard, a court dressmaker, and it was of
the fashion the Queen had set to wear in the gardens of the
Trianon when simplicity became the craze. Antoinette is to have it
copied, so she says.”
Which proved that Antoinette was human, after all, and happy
once more.
“Hang it,” said Nick, “she paid more attention to that gown than
to me. Good-by, Davy. Obey the — the Colonel.”
“Is — is not the Vicomtesse going with you?” I asked
“No, I’m sorry for you,” he called back from the gallery.
He had need to be, for I fell into as great a fright as ever I
had had in my life. Monsieur de St. Gré knocked at the door and
startled me out of my wits. Hearing that I was awake, he had come
in person to make his excuses for leaving me that morning.
“Bon Dieu!” he said, looking at me, “the country has done you
good already. Behold a marvel! Au revoir, David.”
I heard the horses being brought around, and laughter and
voices. How easily I distinguished hers! Then I heard the
hoof-beats on the soft dirt of the drive. Then silence, — the
silence of a summer morning which is all myriad sweet sounds. Then
Lindy appeared, starched and turbaned.
“Marse Dave, how you feel dis mawnin’? Yo’ ’pears mighty peart,
sholy. Marse Dave, yo’ chair is sot on de gallery. Is you ready?
I’ll fotch dat yaller nigger, Andreacute;.”
“You needn’t fetch Andreacute;,” I said; "I can walk.”
“Lan sakes, Marse Dave, but you is bumptious.”
I rose and walked out on the gallery with surprising steadiness.
A great cushioned chair had been placed there and beside it a
table with books, and another chair. I sat down. Lindy looked at
me sharply, but I did not heed her, and presently she retired. The
day, still in its early golden glory, seemed big with prescience.
Above, the saffron haze was lifted, and there was the blue sky.
The breeze held its breath; the fragrance of grass and fruit and
flowers, of the shrub that vied with all, languished on the air.
Out of these things she came.
I knew that she was coming, but I saw her first at the gallery’s
end, the roses she held red against the white linen of her gown.
Then I felt a great yearning and a great dread. I have seen many
of her kind since, and none reflected so truly as she the life of
the old regime. Her dress, her carriage, her air, all suggested
it; and she might, as Nick said, have been walking in the gardens
of the Trianon. Titles I cared nothing for. Hers alone seemed
real, to put her far above me. Had all who bore them been as
worthy, titles would have meant much to mankind.
She was coming swiftly. I rose to my feet before her. I believe
I should have risen in death. And then she was standing beside me,
looking up into my face.
“You must not do that,” she said, “or I will go away.”
I sat down again. She went to the door and called, I following
her with my eyes. Lindy came with a bowl of water.
“Put it on the table,” said the Vicomtesse.
Lindy put the bowl on the table, gave us a glance, and departed
silently. The Vicomtesse began to arrange the flowers in the bowl,
and I watched her, fascinated by her movements. She did everything
quickly, deftly, but this matter took an unconscionable time. She
did not so much as glance at me. She seemed to have forgotten my
presence.
“There,” she said at last, giving them a final touch. "You are
less talkative, if anything, than usual this morning, Mr. Ritchie.
You have not said good morning, you have not told me how you
were — you have not even thanked me for the roses. One might almost
believe that you are sorry to come to Les Iles.”
“One might believe anything who didn’t know, Madame la
Vicomtesse.”
She put her hand to the flowers again.
“It seems a pity to pick them, even in a good cause,” she said.
She was so near me that I could have touched her. A weakness
seized me, and speech was farther away than ever. She moved, she
sat down and looked at me, and the kind of mocking smile came into
her eyes that I knew was the forerunner of raillery.
“There is a statue in the gardens of Versailles which seems
always about to speak, and then to think better of it. You remind
me of that statue, Mr. Ritchie. It is the statue of Wisdom.”
What did she mean?
“Wisdom knows the limitations of its own worth, Madame,” I
replied.
“It is the one particular in which I should have thought wisdom
was lacking,” she said. "You have a tongue, if you will deign to
use it. Or shall I read to you?” she added quickly, picking up a
book. "I have read to the Queen, when Madame Campan was tired. Her
Majesty poor dear lady, did me the honor to say she liked my
English.”
“You have done everything, Madame,” I said.
“I have read to a Queen, to a King’s sister, but never yet — to a
King,” she said, opening the book and giving me the briefest of
glances. "You are all kings in America are you not? What shall I
read?”
“I would rather have you talk to me.”
“Very well, I will tell you how the Queen spoke English. No, I
will not do that,” she said, a swift expression of sadness passing
over her face. "I will never mock her again. She was a good
sovereign and a brave woman and I loved her.” She was silent a
moment, and I thought there was a great weariness in her voice
when she spoke again. "I have every reason to thank God when I
think of the terrors I escaped, of the friends I have found. And
yet I am an unhappy woman, Mr. Ritchie.”
“You are unhappy when you are not doing things for others,
Madame,” I suggested.
“I am a discontented woman,” she said; "I always have been. And
I am unhappy when I think of all those who were dear to me and
whom I loved. Many are dead, and many are scattered and homeless.”
“I have often thought of your sorrows, Madame,” I said.
“Which reminds me that I should not burden you with them, my
good friend, when you are recovering. Do you know that you have
been very near to death?”
“I know, Madame,” I faltered. "I know that had it not been for
you I should not be alive to-day. I know that you risked your life
to save my own.”
She did not answer at once, and when I looked at her she was
gazing out over the flowers on the lawn.
“My life did not matter,” she said. "Let us not talk of that.”
I might have answered, but I dared not speak for fear of saying
what was in my heart. And while I trembled with the repression of
it, she was changed. She turned her face towards me and smiled a
little.
“If you had obeyed me you would not have been so ill,” she said.
“Then I am glad that I did not obey you.”
“Your cousin, the irrepressible Mr. Temple, says I am a tyrant.
Come now, do you think me a tyrant?”
“He has also said other things of you.”
“What other things?”
I blushed at my own boldness.
“He said that if he were not in love with Antoinette, he would
be in love with you.”
“A very safe compliment,” said the Vicomtesse. "Indeed, it
sounds too cautious for Mr. Temple. You must have tampered with
it, Mr. Ritchie,” she flashed. "Mr. Temple is a boy. He needs
discipline. He will have too easy a time with Antoinette.”
“He is not the sort of man you should marry,” I said, and sat
amazed at it.
She looked at me strangely.
“No, he is not,” she answered. "He is more or less the sort of
man I have been thrown with all my life. They toil not, neither do
they spin. I know you will not misunderstand me, for I am very
fond of him. Mr. Temple is honest, fearless, lovable, and of good
instincts. One cannot say as much for the rest of his type. They
go through life fighting, gaming, horse-racing, riding to
hounds, — I have often thought that it was no wonder our privileges
came to an end. So many of us were steeped in selfishness and
vice, were a burden on the world. The early nobles, with all their
crimes, were men who carved their way. Of such were the lords of
the Marches. We toyed with politics, with simplicity, we wasted
the land, we played cards as our coaches passed through
famine-stricken villages. The reckoning came. Our punishment was
not given into the hands of the bourgeois, who would have dealt
justly, but to the scum, the canaille, the demons of the earth.
Had our King, had our nobility, been men with the old fire, they
would not have stood it. They were worn out with centuries of
catering to themselves. Give me a man who will shape his life and
live it with all his strength. I am tired of sham and pretence, of
cynical wit, of mocking at the real things of life, of pride,
vain-glory, and hypocrisy. Give me a man whose existence means
something.”
Was she thinking of the Englishman of whom she had spoken?
Delicacy forbade my asking the question. He had been a man,
according to her own testimony. Where was he now? Her voice had a
ring of earnestness in it I had never heard before, and this
arraignment of her own life and of her old friends surprised me.
Now she seemed lost in a revery, from which I forebore to arouse
her.
“I have often tried to picture your life,” I said at last.
“You?” she answered, turning her head quickly.
“Ever since I first saw the miniature,” I said. "Monsieur de St.
Gre told me some things, and afterwards I read ’Le Mariage de
Figaro,’ and some novels, and some memoirs of the old courts which
I got in Philadelphia last winter. I used to think of you as I
rode over the mountains, as I sat reading in my room of an
evening. I used to picture you in the palaces amusing the Queen
and making the Cardinals laugh. And then I used to wonder — what
became of you — and whether — " I hesitated, overwhelmed by a sudden
confusion, for she was gazing at me fixedly with a look I did not
understand.
“You used to think of that?” she said.
“I never thought to see you,” I answered.
Laughter came into her eyes, and I knew that I had not vexed
her. But I had spoken stupidly, and I reddened.
“I had a quick tongue,” she said, as though to cover my
confusion. "I have it yet. In those days misfortune had not curbed
it. I had not learned to be charitable. When I was a child I used
to ride with my father to the hunts at St. Gré, and I was too
ready to pick out the weaknesses of his guests. If one of the
company had a trick or a mannerism, I never failed to catch it.
People used to ask me what I thought of such and such a person,
and that was bad for me. I saw their failings and pretensions, but
I ignored my own. It was the same at Abbaye aux Bois, the convent
where I was taught. When I was presented to her Majesty I saw why
people hated her. They did not understand her. She was a woman
with a large heart, with charity. Some did not suspect this,
others forgot it because they beheld a brilliant personage with
keen perceptions who would not submit to being bored. Her Majesty
made many enemies at court of persons who believed she was making
fun of them. There was a dress-maker at the French court called
Mademoiselle Bertin, who became ridiculously pretentious because
the Queen allowed the woman to dress her hair in private. Bertin
used to put on airs with the nobility when they came to order
gowns, and she was very rude to me when I went for my court dress.
There was a ball at Versailles the day I was presented, and my
father told me that her Majesty wished to speak with me. I was
very much frightened. The Queen was standing with her back to the
mirror, the Duchesse de Polignac and some other ladies beside her,
when my father brought me up, and her Majesty was smiling.
“’What did you say to Bertin, Mademoiselle?’ she asked.
“I was more frightened than ever, but the remembrance of the
woman’s impudence got the better of me.
“’I told her that in dressing your Majesty’s hair she had
acquired all the court accomplishments but one.’
“’I’ll warrant that Bertin was curious,’ said the Queen.
“’She was, your Majesty.’
“’What is the accomplishment she lacks?’ the Queen demanded; ’I
should like to know it myself.’
“It is discrimination, your Majesty. I told the woman there were
some people she could be rude to with impunity. I was not one of
them.’
“’She’ll never be rude to you again, Mademoiselle,’ said the
Queen.
“’I am sure of it, your Majesty,’ I said.
“The Queen laughed, and bade the Duchesse de Polignac invite me
to supper that evening. My father was delighted, — I was more
frightened than ever. But the party was small, her Majesty was
very gracious and spoke to me often, and I saw that above all
things she liked to be amused. Poor lady! It was a year after that
terrible affair of the necklace, and she wished to be distracted
from thinking of the calumnies which were being heaped upon her.
She used to send for me often during the years that followed, and
I might have had a place at court near her person. But my father
was sensible enough to advise me not to accept, — if I could refuse
without offending her Majesty. The Queen was not offended; she was
good enough to say that I was wise in my request. She had, indeed,
abolished most of the ridiculous etiquette of the court. She would
not eat in public, she would not be followed around the palace by
ladies in court gowns, she would not have her ladies in the room
when she was dressing. If she wished a mirror, she would not wait
for it to be passed through half a dozen hands and handed her by a
Princess of the Blood. Sometimes she used to summon me to amuse
her and walk with me by the water in the beautiful gardens of the
Petit Triano. I used to imitate the people she disliked. I
disliked them, too. I have seen her laugh until the tears came
into her eyes when I talked of Monsieur Necker. As the dark days
drew nearer I loved more and more to be in the seclusion of the
country at Montméry, at the St. Gré of my girlhood. I can see St.
Gre now,” said the Vicomtesse, “the thatched houses of the little
village on either side of the high-road, the honest, red-faced
peasants courtesying in their doorways at our berline, the brick
wall of the park, the iron gates beside the lodge, the long avenue
of poplars, the deer feeding in the beechwood, the bridge over the
shining stream and the long, weather-beaten château beyond it.
Paris and the muttering of the storm were far away. The mornings
on the sunny terrace looking across the valley to the blue hills,
the walks in the village, grew very dear to me. We do not know the
value of things, Mr. Ritchie, until we are about to lose them.”
“You did not go back to court?” I asked.
She sighed.
“Yes, I went back. I thought it my duty. I was at Versailles
that terrible summer when the States General met, when the
National Assembly grew out of it, when the Bastille was stormed,
when the King was throwing away his prerogatives like confetti.
Never did the gardens of the Trianon seem more beautiful, or more
sad. Sometimes the Queen would laugh even then when I mimicked
Bailly, Des Moulins, Mirabeau. I was with her Majesty in the
gardens on that dark, rainy day when the fishwomen came to
Versailles. The memory of that night will haunt me as long as I
live. The wind howled, the rain lashed with fury against the
windows, the mob tore through the streets of the town, sacked the
wine-shops, built great fires at the corners. Before the day
dawned again the furies had broken into the palace and murdered
what was left of the Guard. You have heard how they carried off
the King and Queen to Paris — how they bore the heads of the
soldiers on their pikes. I saw it from a window, and I shall never
forget it.”
Her voice faltered, and there were tears on her lashes. Some
quality in her narration brought before me so vividly the scenes
of which she spoke that I started when she had finished. There was
much more I would have known, but I could not press her to speak
longer on a subject that gave her pain. At that moment she seemed
more distant to me than ever before. She rose, went into the
house, and left me thinking of the presumptions of the hopes I had
dared to entertain, left me picturing sadly the existence of which
she had spoken. Why had she told me of it? Perchance she had
thought to do me a kindness!
She came back to me — I had not thought she would. She sat down
with her embroidery in her lap, and for some moments busied
herself with it in silence. Then she said, without looking up: —
“I do not know why I have tired you with this, why I have
saddened myself. It is past and gone.”
“I was not tired, Madame. It is very difficult to live in the
present when the past has been so brilliant,” I answered.
“So brilliant!” She sighed. "So thoughtless, — I think that is the
sharpest regret.” I watched her fingers as they stitched,
wondering how they could work so rapidly. At last she said in a
low voice, “Antoinette and Mr. Temple have told me something of
your life, Mr. Ritchie.”
I laughed.
“It has been very humble,” I replied.
“What I heard was — interesting to me,” she said, turning over her
frame. "Will you not tell me something of it?”
“Gladly, Madame, if that is the case,” I answered.
“Well, then,” she said, “why don’t you?”
“I do not know which part you would like, Madame. Shall I tell
you about Colonel Clark? I do not know when to begin — "
She dropped her sewing in her lap and looked up at me quickly.
“I told you that you were a strange man,” she said. "I almost
lose patience with you. No, don’t tell me about Colonel Clark — at
least not until you come to him. Begin at the beginning, at the
cabin in the mountains.”
“You want the whole of it!” I exclaimed.
She picked up her embroidery again and bent over it with a
smile.
“Yes, I want the whole of it.”
So I began at the cabin in the mountains. I cannot say that I
ever forgot she was listening, but I lost myself in the narrative.
It presented to me, for the first time, many aspects that I had
not thought of. For instance, that I should be here now in
Louisiana telling it to one who had been the companion and friend
of the Queen of France. Once in a while the Vicomtesse would look
up at me swiftly, when I paused, and then go on with her work
again. I told her of Temple Bow, and how I had run away; of Polly
Ann and Tom, of the Wilderness Trail and how I shot Cutcheon, of
the fight at Crab Orchard, of the life in Kentucky, of Clark and
his campaign. Of my doings since; how I had found Nick and how he
had come to New Orleans with me; of my life as a lawyer in
Louisville, of the conventions I had been to. The morning wore on
to midday, and I told her more than I believed it possible to tell
any one. When at last I had finished a fear grew upon me that I
had told her too much. Her fingers still stitched, her head was
bent and I could not see her face, — only the knot of her hair
coiled with an art that struck me suddenly. Then she spoke, and
her voice was very low.
“I love Polly Ann,” she said; "I should like to know her.”
“I wish that you could know her,” I answered, quickening.
She raised her head, and looked at me with an expression that
was not a smile. I could not say what it was, or what it meant.
“I do not think you are stupid,” she said, in the same tone,
"but I do not believe you know how remarkable your life has been.
I can scarcely realize that you have seen all this, have done all
this, have felt all this. You are a lawyer, a man of affairs, and
yet you could guide me over the hidden paths of half a continent.
You know the mountain ranges, the passes, the rivers, the fords,
the forest trails, the towns and the men who made them!” She
picked up her sewing and bent over it once more. "And yet you did
not think that this would interest me.”
Perchance it was a subtle summons in her voice I heard that bade
me open the flood-gates of my heart, — I know not. I know only that
no power on earth could have held me silent then.
“Hélène!” I said, and stopped. My heart beat so wildly that I
could hear it. "I do not know why I should dare to think of you,
to look up to you — Hélène, I love you, I shall love you till I die.
I love you with all the strength that is in me, with all my soul.
You know it, and if you did not I could hide it no more. As long
as I live there will never be another woman in the world for me. I
love you. You will forgive me because of the torture I have
suffered, because of the pain I shall suffer when I think of you
in the years to come.”
Her sewing dropped to her lap — to the floor. She looked at me,
and the light which I saw in her eyes flooded my soul with a joy
beyond my belief. I trembled with a wonder that benumbed me. I
would have got to my feet had she not come to me swiftly, that I
might not rise. She stood above me, I lifted up my arms; she bent
to me with a movement that conferred a priceless thing.
“David,” she said, “could you not tell that I loved you, that
you were he who has been in my mind for so many years, and in my
heart since I saw you?”
“I could not tell,” I said. "I dared not think it. I — I thought
there was another.”
She was seated on the arm of my chair. She drew back her head
with a smile trembling on her lips, with a lustre burning in her
eyes like a vigil — a vigil for me.
“He reminded me of you,” she answered.
I was lost in sheer, bewildering happiness. And she who created
it, who herself was that happiness, roused me from it.
“What are you thinking?” she asked.
“I was thinking that a star has fallen, — that I may have a jewel
beyond other men,” I said.
“And a star has risen for me,” she said, “that I may have a
guide beyond other women.”
“Then it is you who have raised it, Hélène.” I was silent a
moment, trying again to bring the matter within my grasp. "Do you
mean that you love me, that you will marry me, that you will come
back to Kentucky with me and will be content, — you, who have been
the companion of a Queen?”
There came an archness into her look that inflamed me the more.
“I, who have been the companion of a Queen, love you, will marry
you, will go back to Kentucky with you and be content,” she
repeated. "And yet not I, David, but another woman — a happy woman.
You shall be my refuge, my strength, my guide. You will lead me
over the mountains and through the wilderness by the paths you
know. You will bring me to Polly Ann that I may thank her for the
gift of you, — above all other gifts in the world.”
I was silent again.
“Hélène,” I said at last, “will you give me the miniature?”
“On one condition,” she replied.
“Yes,” I said, “yes. And again yes. What is it?”
“That you will obey me — sometimes.”
“It is a privilege I long for,” I answered.
“You did not begin with promise,” she said.
I released her hand, and she drew the ivory from her gown and
gave it me. I kissed it.
“I will go to Monsieur Isadore’s and get the frame,” I said.
“When I give you permission,” said Hélène, gently.
I have written this story for her eyes.
CHAPTER XV.
an episode in the life of a man
Out of the blood and ashes of France a Man had arisen who moved
real kings and queens on his chess-board — which was a large part of
the world. The Man was Napoleon Buonaparte, at present, for lack
of a better name, First Consul of the French Republic. The Man’s
eye, sweeping the world for a new plaything, had rested upon one
which had excited the fancy of lesser adventurers, of one John
Law, for instance. It was a large, unwieldy plaything indeed, and
remote. It was nothing less than that vast and mysterious country
which lay beyond the monster yellow River of the Wilderness, the
country bordered on the south by the Gulf swamps, on the north by
no man knew what forests, — as dark as those the Romans found in
Gaul, — on the west by a line which other generations might be left
to settle.
This land was Louisiana.
A future king of France, while an émigré, had been to Louisiana.
This is merely an interesting fact worth noting. It was not
interesting to Napoleon.
Napoleon, by dint of certain screws which he tightened on his
Catholic Majesty, King Charles of Spain, in the Treaty of San
Ildefonso on the 1st of October, 1800, got his plaything.
Louisiana was French again, — whatever French was in those days. The
treaty was a profound secret. But secrets leak out, even the
profoundest; and this was wafted across the English Channel to the
ears of Mr. Rufus King, American Minister at London, who wrote of
it to one Thomas Jefferson, President of the United States. Mr.
Jefferson was interested, not to say alarmed.
Mr. Robert Livingston was about to depart on his mission from
the little Republic of America to the great Republic of France.
Mr. Livingston was told not to make himself disagreeable, but to
protest. If Spain was to give up the plaything, the Youngest Child
among the Nations ought to have it. It lay at her doors, it was
necessary for her growth.
Mr. Livingston arrived in France to find that Louisiana was a
mere pawn on the chess-board, the Republic he represented little
more. He protested, and the great Talleyrand shrugged his
shoulders. What was Monsieur talking about? A treaty. What treaty?
A treaty with Spain ceding back Louisiana to France after forty
years. Who said there was such a treaty? Did Monsieur take snuff?
Would Monsieur call again when the Minister was less busy?
Monsieur did call again, taking care not to make himself
disagreeable. He was offered snuff. He called again, pleasantly.
He was offered snuff. He called again. The great Talleyrand
laughed. He was always so happy to see Monsieur when he
(Talleyrand) was not busy. He would give Monsieur a certificate of
importunity. He had quite forgotten what Monsieur was talking
about on former occasions. Oh, yes, a treaty. Well, suppose there
was such a treaty, what then?
What then? Mr. Livingston, the agreeable but importunate, went
home and wrote a memorial, and was presently assured that the
inaccessible Man who was called First Consul had read it with
interest — great interest. Mr. Livingston did not cease to indulge
in his enjoyable visits to Talleyrand — not he. But in the intervals
he sat down to think.
What did the inaccessible Man himself have in his mind?
The Man had been considering the Anglo-Saxon race, and in
particular that portion of it which inhabited the Western
Hemisphere. He perceived that they were a quarrelsome people,
which possessed the lust for land and conquest like the rest of
their blood. He saw with astonishment something that had happened,
something that they had done. Unperceived by the world, in five
and twenty years they had swept across a thousand miles of
mountain and forest wilderness in ever increasing thousands, had
beaten the fiercest of savage tribes before them, stolidly
unmindful of their dead. They had come at length to the great
yellow River, and finding it closed had cried aloud in their
anger. What was beyond it to stop them? Spain, with a handful of
subjects inherited from the France of Louis the Fifteenth.
Could Spain stop them? No. But he, the Man, would stop them. He
would raise up in Louisiana as a monument to himself a daughter of
France to curb their ambition. America should not be all
Anglo-Saxon.
Already the Americans had compelled Spain to open the River. How
long before they would overrun Louisiana itself, until a Frenchman
or a Spaniard could scarce be found in the land?
Sadly, in accordance with the treaty which Monsieur Talleyrand
had known nothing about, his Catholic Majesty instructed his
Intendant at New Orleans to make ready to deliver Louisiana to the
French Commission. That was in July, 1802. This was not exactly an
order to close the River again — in fact, his Majesty said nothing
about closing the River. Mark the reasoning of the Spanish mind.
The Intendant closed the River as his plain duty. And Kentucky and
Tennessee, wayward, belligerent infants who had outgrown their
swaddling clothes, were heard from again. The Nation had learned
to listen to them. The Nation was very angry. Mr. Hamilton and the
Federalists and many others would have gone to war and seized the
Floridas.
Mr. Jefferson said, “Wait and see what his Catholic Majesty has
to say.” Mr. Jefferson was a man of great wisdom, albeit he had
mistaken Jacobinism for something else when he was younger. And he
knew that Napoleon could not play chess in the wind. The wind was
rising.
Mr. Livingston was a patriot, able, importunate, but getting on
in years and a little hard of hearing. Importunity without an Army
and a Navy behind it is not effective — especially when there is no
wind. But Mr. Jefferson heard the wind rising, and he sent Mr.
Monroe to Mr. Livingston’s aid. Mr. Monroe was young, witty,
lively, popular with people he met. He, too, heard the wind
rising, and so now did Mr. Livingston.
The ships containing the advance guard of the colonists destined
for the new Louisiana lay in the roads at Dunkirk, their anchors
ready to weigh, — three thousand men, three thousand horses, for the
Man did things on a large scale. The anchors were not weighed.
His Catholic Majesty sent word from Spain to Mr. Jefferson that
he was sorry his Intendant had been so foolish. The River was
opened again.
The Treaty of Amiens was a poor wind-shield. It blew down, and
the chessmen began to totter. One George of England, noted for his
frugal table and his quarrelsome disposition, who had previously
fought with France, began to call the Man names. The Man called
George names, and sat down to think quickly. George could not be
said to be on the best of terms with his American relations, but
the Anglo-Saxon is unsentimental, phlegmatic, setting money and
trade and lands above ideals. George meant to go to war again.
Napoleon also meant to go to war again. But George meant to go to
war again right away, which was inconvenient and inconsiderate,
for Napoleon had not finished his game of chess. The obvious
outcome of the situation was that George with his Navy would get
Louisiana, or else help his relations to get it. In either case
Louisiana would become Anglo-Saxon.
This was the wind which Mr. Jefferson had heard.
The Man, being a genius who let go gracefully when he had to,
decided between two bad bargains. He would sell Louisiana to the
Americans as a favor; they would be very, very grateful, and they
would go on hating George. Moreover, he would have all the more
money with which to fight George.
The inaccessible Man suddenly became accessible. Nay, he became
gracious, smiling, full of loving-kindness, charitable. Certain
dickerings followed by a bargain passed between the American
Minister and Monsieur Barbe-Marbois. Then Mr. Livingston and Mr.
Monroe dined with the hitherto inaccessible. And the Man, after
the manner of Continental Personages, asked questions. Frederick
the Great has started this fashion, and many have imitated it.
Louisiana became American at last. Whether by destiny or chance,
whether by the wisdom of Jefferson or the necessity of Napoleon,
who can say? It seems to me, David Ritchie, writing many years
after the closing words of the last chapter were penned, that it
was ours inevitably. For I have seen and known and loved the
people with all their crudities and faults, whose inheritance it
was by right of toil and suffering and blood.
And I, David Ritchie, saw the flags of three nations waving over
it in the space of two days. And it came to pass in this wise.
Rumors of these things which I have told above had filled
Kentucky from time to time, and in November of 1803 there came
across the mountains the news that the Senate of the United States
had ratified the treaty between our ministers and Napoleon.
I will not mention here what my life had become, what my
fortune, save to say that both had been far beyond my
expectations. In worldly goods and honors, in the respect and
esteem of my fellow-men, I had been happy indeed. But I had been
blessed above other men by one whose power it was to lift me above
the mean and sordid things of this world.
Many times in the pursuit of my affairs I journeyed over that
country which I had known when it belonged to the Indian and the
deer and the elk and the wolf and the buffalo. Often did she ride
by my side, making light of the hardships which, indeed, were no
hardships to her, wondering at the settlements which had sprung up
like magic in the wilderness, which were the heralds of the
greatness of the Republic, — her country now.
So, in the bright and boisterous March weather of the year 1804,
we found ourselves riding together along the way made memorable by
the footsteps of Clark and his backwoodsmen. For I had an errand
in St. Louis with Colonel Chouteau. A subtle change had come upon
Kaskaskia with the new blood which was flowing into it: we passed
Cahokia, full of memories to the drummer boy whom she loved. There
was the church, the garrison, the stream, and the little house
where my Colonel and I had lived together. She must see them all,
she must hear the story from my lips again; and the telling of it
to her gave it a new fire and a new life.
At evening, when the March wind had torn the cotton clouds to
shreds, we stood on the Mississippi’s bank, gazing at the western
shore, at Louisiana. The low, forest-clad hills made a black band
against the sky, and above the band hung the sun, a red ball. He
was setting, and man might look upon his face without fear. The
sight of the waters of that river stirred me to think of many
things. What had God in store for the vast land out of which the
waters flowed? Had He, indeed, saved it for a People, a People to
be drawn from all nations, from all classes? Was the principle of
the Republic to prevail and spread and change the complexion of
the world? Or were the lusts of greed and power to increase until
in the end they had swallowed the leaven? Who could say? What man
of those who, soberly, had put his hand to the Paper which
declared the opportunities of generations to come, could measure
the Force which he had helped to set in motion.
We crossed the river to the village where I had been so kindly
received many years ago — to St. Louis. The place was little
changed. The wind was stilled, the blue wood smoke curled lazily
from the wide stone chimneys of the houses nestling against the
hill. The afterglow was fading into night; lights twinkled in the
windows. Followed by our servants we climbed the bank, Hélène and
I, and walked the quiet streets bordered by palings. The evening
was chill. We passed a bright cabaret from which came the sound of
many voices; in the blacksmith’s shop another group was gathered,
and we saw faces eager in the red light. They were talking of the
Cession.
We passed that place where Nick had stopped Suzanne in the cart,
and laughed at the remembrance. We came to Monsieur Gratiot’s, for
he had bidden us to stay with him. And with Madame he gave us a
welcome to warm our hearts after our journey.
“David,” he said, “I have seen many strange things happen in my
life, but the strangest of all is that Clark’s drummer boy should
have married a Vicomtesse of the old regime.”
And she was ever Madame la Vicomtesse to our good friends in St.
Louis, for she was a woman to whom a title came as by nature’s
right.
“And you are about to behold another strange thing David,”
Monsieur Gratiot continued. "To-day you are on French territory.”
“French territory!” I exclaimed.
“To-day Upper Louisiana is French,” he answered. "To-morrow it
will be American forever. This morning Captain Stoddard of the
United States Army, empowered to act as a Commissioner of the
French Republic, arrived with Captain Lewis and a guard of
American troops. Today, at noon, the flag of Spain was lowered
from the staff at the headquarters. To-night a guard of honor
watches with the French Tricolor, and we are French for the last
time. To-morrow we shall be Americans.”
I saw that simple ceremony. The little company of soldiers was
drawn up before the low stone headquarters, the villagers with
heads uncovered gathered round about. I saw the Stars and Stripes
rising, the Tricolor setting. They met midway on the staff, hung
together for a space, and a salute to the two nations echoed among
the hills across the waters of the great River that rolled
impassive by.
AFTERWORD
This book has been named "The Crossing" because I have tried to
express in it the beginnings of that great movement across the
mountains which swept resistless over the Continent until at last
it saw the Pacific itself. The Crossing was the first instinctive
reaching out of an infant nation which was one day to become a
giant. No annals in the world’s history are more wonderful than
the story of the conquest of Kentucky and Tennessee by the
pioneers.
This name, “The Crossing,” is likewise typical in another sense.
The political faith of our forefathers, of which the Constitution
is the creed, was made to fit a more or less homogeneous body of
people who proved that they knew the meaning of the word
"Liberty.” By Liberty, our forefathers meant the Duty as well as
the Right of man to govern himself. The Constitution amply attests
the greatness of its authors, but it was a compromise. It was an
attempt to satisfy thirteen colonies, each of which clung
tenaciously to its identity. It suited the eighteenth-century
conditions of a little English-speaking confederacy along the
seaboard, far removed from the world’s strife and jealousy. It
scarcely contemplated that the harassed millions of Europe would
flock to its fold, and it did not foresee that, in less than a
hundred years, its own citizens would sweep across the three
thousand miles of forest and plain and mountain to the Western
Ocean, absorb French and Spanish Louisiana, Spanish Texas, Mexico,
and California, fill this land with broad farmsteads and populous
cities, cover it with a network of railroads.
Would the Constitution, made to meet the needs of the little
confederacy of the seaboard, stretch over a Continent and an
Empire?
We are fighting out that question to-day. But The Crossing was
in Daniel Boone’s time, in George Rogers Clark’s. Would the
Constitution stand the strain? And will it stand the strain now
that the once remote haven of the oppressed has become a
world-power?
It was a difficult task in a novel to gather the elements
necessary to picture this movement: the territory was vast, the
types bewildering. The lonely mountain cabin; the seigniorial life
of the tide-water; the foothills and mountains which the
Scotch-Irish have marked for their own to this day; the Wilderness
Trail; the wonderland of Kentucky, and the cruel fighting in the
border forts there against the most relentless of foes; George
Rogers Clark and his momentous campaign which gave to the Republic
Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois; the transition period — the coming of
the settler after the pioneer; Louisiana, St. Louis, and New
Orleans, — to cover this ground, to picture the passions and
politics of the time, to bring the counter influence of the French
Revolution as near as possible to reality, has been a three years’
task. The autobiography of David Ritchie is as near as I can get
to its solution, and I have a great sense of its incompleteness.
I had hoped when I planned the series to bring down this novel
through the stirring period which ended, by a chance, when a
steamboat brought supplies to Jackson’s army in New Orleans — the
beginning of the era of steam commerce on our Western waters. This
work will have to be reserved for a future time.
I have tried to give a true history of Clark’s campaign as seen
by an eyewitness, trammelled as little as possible by romance.
Elsewhere, as I look back through these pages, I feel as though
the soil had only been scraped. What principality in the world has
the story to rival that of John Sevier and the State of Franklin?
I have tried to tell the truth as I went along. General Jackson
was a boy at the Waxhaws and dug his toes in the red mud. He was a
man at Jonesboro, and tradition says that he fought with a
fence-rail. Sevier was captured as narrated. Monsieur Gratiot,
Monsieur Vigo, and Father Gibault lost the money which they gave
to Clark and their country. Monsieur Vigo actually travelled in
the state which Davy describes when he went down the river with
him. Monsieur Gratiot and Colonel Auguste Chouteau and Madame
Chouteau are names so well known in St. Louis that it is
superfluous to say that such persons existed and were the foremost
citizens of the community.
Among the many to whom my apologies and thanks are due is Mr.
Pierre Chouteau of St. Louis, whose unremitting labors have
preserved and perpetuated the history and traditions of the
country of his ancestors. I would that I had been better able to
picture the character, the courage, the ability, and patriotism of
the French who settled Louisiana. The Republic owes them much, and
their descendants are to-day among the stanchest preservers of her
ideals.
WINSTON CHURCHILL.
Boston, April 18, 1904
Notes
- Map.
The best map which the editor has found of this district is in vol.
VI, Part 11, of Winsor’s “Narrative and Critical History of
America,” p. 721. — Author’s note
-
À pieds nus.
Barefoot.
-
Colonel George Rogers Clark.
It appears that Mr. Clark had not yet received the title of
Colonel, though he held command. — EDITOR.
-
Mad Anthony. General
Anthony Wayne of Revolutionary fame was then in command of that
district.
— Author’s note
-
Nouvelle Orleans.
It is unnecessary for the editor to remind the reader that these
are not Mr. Ritchie’s words, but those of an adventurer. Mr. Depeau was
an honest and worthy gentleman, earnest enough in a cause which was more
to his credit than to an American’s. According to contemporary evidence,
Madame Depeau was in New Orleans.
— Author’s note
Text prepared by:
- Justin Calhoun
- Brandon Davis
- Daniel Gladney
- Bruce R. Magee
- Mahdi Saleh
- Taylor Thelander
Source
Churchill, Winston. The Crossing. Internet Archive. New York: Macmillan & Co., n.d. Web. 02 Mar. 2015. <https://archive.org/details/crossing00 churiala>.
L’Anthologie Louisianaise